


batman & (smol) son

by happyrobins



Category: Batman (Comics), DCU (Comics)
Genre: AU, Family Fluff, Family Issues, Gen, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Sibling Rivalry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-01
Updated: 2015-09-12
Packaged: 2018-04-18 09:46:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 39,553
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4701476
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/happyrobins/pseuds/happyrobins
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bruce meets his son Damian when the boy is five instead of ten; half the age but twice the trouble >:)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Damian keeps his fingers wrapped tightly around the handle of the small dagger. It’s his only protection now, as he sneaks through the battlefield their home has become. His mama—her voice firm and urgent, the sword in her hand dripping blood—ordered him to stay in the secret passage underneath his playroom floor. But it was dark, and dusty enough to make him sneeze, and he got hungry. 

He left his hiding place thinking he was alone. The house has been deathly silent for hours now, the fighting is over. He walks past broken bodies on his way to the kitchens. There's no sign of life from any of them, and several familiar faces make his breath hitch in his throat. But he doesn't have time to linger. His mama needs him. He needs to find her.

Damian was _sure_ he was alone. So it's a surprise when he peeks around a doorway and sees a tall man standing there, facing away from him. The man in the dark cloak.

The man walks silently as a ghost, even his cloak slithering over the ground doesn't make any noise. He crouches beside the body of one of the guards, the nice one that always gave Damian paper folded into little animals, and touches her neck. Damian wonders if he's a spirit of death.

Damian grips his dagger tighter, hidden behind a big clay pot as he tries to decide whether to run away or attack. If he sneaks up on the man he can probably-- 

“I know you’re there,” the man says without looking over. He stands and turns, his eerie white eyes finding exactly where Damian is hidden. “I’m not going to hurt you. Your mother called me here to help.” He's speaking English, but he repeats himself in Arabic. His accent is odd.

Damian steps forward slowly, warily, holding his knife out as a warning. "Hello."

“Hello, Damian. I’m a friend of your mother’s. Do you know where she is?”

Damian shakes his head. “They took her away.” He tries to be strong, to hold his chin up and sound brave, but it's too hard. His voice wobbles and his eyes fill with tears that he quickly wipes away on his sleeve.

“It’s going to be okay," the man says, kneeling in front of Damian, and something about his calm voice makes Damian believe him. 

The man looks familiar, Damian realizes once he's blinked back his tears. He's seen those pointy ears and that sharp nose before.

“You’re a bat.” He reaches up and touches the nose of the man’s mask. “Mama has one of these. She keeps it in her bedroom.”

The man's frown shifts from serious into something tinged with sadness. Damian tries to tug the mask off but the man places a gloved hand overtop his and stops him.

“You can call me Batman," he says, serious again. “Are you hurt?”

Damian's white clothes are splattered with blood, but almost none of it belongs to him. “My elbows hurt a lot. I fell down.” He shows Batman the bloody scrapes on his arms. “And someone hit me in the head, but it stopped hurting.” His mother had killed the man responsible, plunging her sword deep until she was satisfied with his pain and then scooping Damian up, kissing his head as she carried him to safety.

Batman carefully inspects the bump on Damian's head and lets out a quiet grunt. His shoulders relax like a large weight of worry has been lifted. “That’s all?”

Damian nods. 

“Damian, do you know if anyone else here needs help? I haven’t checked the entire building yet.”

“They don’t. They’re all dead,” says Damian. Batman frowns and straightens up, looking disconcerted. “Everybody else escaped before the bad people came. My nannies wanted me to go too, but Mama said it was too dangerous. It was safer to hide than run away with them.” Damian swallows against the lump in his throat as he remembers the fear on his mother’s face when he last saw her. “I... I need to find my mama. Do you think she’s safe? They took her, but do you think she got away after?”

Batman holds out his hand. “Come with me and we’ll go find her together.”

Damian hesitates for a moment, looking up at the strange, costumed man. He drops his dagger and places his small hand in Batman's larger, stronger one, then lets the man pick him up and carry him out. 

They walk past the blank-eyed, bloody body of Damian's fencing tutor, and Batman gently presses Damian's face against his neck so the boy won't see. Damian thinks that's silly—he's seen lots of bodies, he's not scared. He isn't a baby anymore. But it's nice to be held, so he wraps his arms around Batman's neck and clings. He hasn't felt this safe since he was last in his mother's arms.

 

* * *

 

Batman has the best plane Damian has ever been in. He can't sit still, fidgeting in the big leather seat, straining against the seatbelts Batman had adjusted as tight as possible to fit him. He just wants to be able to see over the dashboard. He just wants to _see_.

He nibbles on an odd chewy bar Batman gave him. It tastes like burnt chocolate and he doesn't like it very much but he's too hungry to complain.

“We’ll be in the air for a couple of hours," Batman says, pressing the tantalizingly glowing buttons. Damian would give anything to be able to push just one. He tried earlier but Batman caught his hand before he could and scowled at him. "You should get some sleep.”

Damian _is_ tired. The seat is comfy and the hum of the engine is soothing and he's having trouble keeping his eyes open. But he doesn't want to sleep. “You talk funny. Where are you from?”

“Gotham City, in America.”

That perks Damian right up. He straightens up and leans forward excitedly. “That’s where my father lives," he tells Batman proudly, bouncing in his seat. “Do you know him? He’s like a king there, Mama said. He protects the city. Mama tells me stories about him. I’m going to meet him when I’m old enough.”

It takes a long time for Batman to answer. He keeps himself busy with the controls as though he can pretend he's forgotten the question, but Damian watches him intently, waiting. “Yes. I know him," he says eventually, his voice thick with something Damian can't identify. He opens a storage compartment under his seat and pulls out a blanket that he tucks around Damian, then pats his dark hair. “Go to sleep, Damian.”

“Tell me a story,” Damian says around a yawn. His eyes are drifting shut. "I'm not sleepy yet," he murmurs, half-dozing.

Batman sighs and obliges, his low voice carrying Damian off to sleep with a story the boy won't be able to remember afterwards, as much as he tries.

 

* * *

 

Damian wakes up to the creak of metal and his mama's voice.

“I told you to find him and take him somewhere safe, not bring him straight into the danger and leave him _alone_ ," Talia scolds Batman as the airplane's windshield slides open. She climbs into the cockpit, her expression equal parts relieved and distraught, and unbuckles Damian's safety belt so she can pull him into her arms. There’s a scratch on her face and a bruise swelling on her forehead but she’s alive and here and hugging him. "Damian, my love. Are you hurt?"

He shakes his head as best he can while being held so tightly. "I'm fine, Mama. I worried about you."

"Not as much as I worried about you," she murmurs into his hair. 

With reluctance, Talia releases her son and hands him down to Batman's upstretched hands. Damian scowls at being passed around like some kind of parcel. He could have hopped down just fine on his own.

“He was perfectly safe in the plane," says Batman as he sets Damian on the ground gently. Damian wonders where they are. He can see the shapes of buildings just beyond the trees, and the air smells like smoke.

"I didn't ask for you to help _me_ , only Damian. I was fine. It was only a matter of time before Father’s backup arrived,” Talia retorts heatedly. "If you hadn't interfered, none of them would have escaped. Their leader wouldn't have escaped!"

"I was trying to stop your father's assassins from slaughtering everyone in the compound. There was no need for that much bloodshed."

"You inserted yourself into a battle you don't understand in the slightest. You saw the destruction on my island, and they could have done much worse. You have no idea. We were lucky to be forewarned, if only by a few minutes. They could have—“ Her voice breaks and she closes her eyes in pain. Damian takes her hand and squeezes it, the same way she does to him when he’s upset.

“Talia,” Batman says quietly, “why didn't you tell me about my son until today?”

Damian's dark eyebrows knit together in confusion. "Mama?"

She pats him lightly on the head. ”Wait here, darling. We need to speak privately for a moment."

Damian frowns at their backs as they walk into the woods, out of earshot. He’s formulating a plan for the best way to sneak after them and eavesdrop when he hears the hum of a helicopter approaching. It’s painted dark for stealth and he takes a few seconds to spot it moving across the night sky like a shadow. 

Assassins jump out of the helicopter as it lands on the other side of the clearing—Damian’s about to dart into the trees to hide and warn his mama, but then he recognizes their uniforms. They’re his grandfather’s soldiers.

The squad leader hurries over to Talia as she returns, but halts and steps out of the way, head bowed deferentially, at a dismissive wave of her hand.

Talia kneels in front of Damian and places her hands lightly on his shoulders. “Damian. I had hoped to wait until you were older to tell you this, but it appears that is no longer possible.” She leans forward and whispers it in his ear, the secret he's been waiting so long to know: “Your father’s name is Bruce Wayne. Many know him instead as a hero named Batman.”

Damian stares at the man standing beside his mother. “He’s my father?” he says, awed. Then, more excitedly, his face breaking into a delighted smile, “You’re my father! You’re even taller than I thought!” He raises his arms in a plea to be picked up, and his father obeys. 

Damian pulls at the dark cowl to tug it off. This time Batman lets him.

His father has dark hair that's damp and mussed from wearing that cowl, a deep wrinkle between his eyebrows, and blue eyes like Damian has always known—his have never been as green as his mama's. The man's serious frown relaxes into something that's almost a smile as he brushes Damian's cheek with his fingertips, gently as a breath of air.

Damian scrutinizes him for a long moment, and then nods in acceptance. Yes, this man will do; this will be his father.

Batman clears his throat, sounding almost nervous. "Would you like to stay with me in Gotham for a while?” he asks.

“Yes!” Damian says eagerly. He gets so caught up in the idea of finally spending time with his father—already making demands of his rooms and everything they must do together and everything his father must teach him, and of course they _must_ visit one of those American amusement parks he has seen pictures of... and then he looks over and notices his mama standing apart from them, silent. She seems too far away, out of reach.

Damian squirms until his father gets the hint and puts him back down. He tugs on his mother's sleeve, trying to pull her over to his father, but she won't budge. “Hurry, Mama," he whines. "I don’t want to wait any longer. I want to go to Gotham City right now.”

“I’m afraid I won’t be accompanying you," Talia tells him. She meets Batman's gaze in a determined, prolonged way that has Damian looking from one parent to the other in confusion. His father looks away first.

"But, _why_?" Damian asks plaintively. "We can be together with Father now, like we're supposed to be.” He crosses his arms, pouting. His best trick for getting his way. "I won't go without you."

But it doesn't work this time. Talia just shakes her head sadly.

"No, Damian. You must go with your Father. I have too much work I must take care of to go with you right now, but I promise you I'll visit within a week." She kisses him on the forehead as her blessing and then she’s turning towards the helicopter, smiling at him over her shoulder. "Go, my love. I know how long you’ve dreamt of this."

 

* * *

 

"Where are the rest of your servants?" asks Damian, peering at Alfred like it's some kind of trick, like the rest are hiding behind him. 

"Alfred isn't a servant," Bruce corrects. He unclasps his cape and drapes it over the back of his chair as he sits down and boots up the computer for the first time in what feels like far too long. "He's family. He raised me." 

An overwhelming amount of work has piled up in the two days he was gone. On their way back to Gotham they had to stop and spend the night at a Wayne Enterprises-owned hotel in Rome to get Damian some proper food, a bath, and clean clothes that weren’t covered with blood. 

Bruce didn't sleep a wink that night. He spent it lying awake staring at the other bed across the dark room and the small figure under the blanket, trying to fathom the turn his life has taken. He knows Damian never actually fell asleep, either.

Damian tilts his head curiously. "Does that mean you're my grandfather?" he asks Alfred.

Alfred raises an eyebrow. He doesn't show it, but Bruce is sure his heart is swelling in joy. “I am merely the butler, Master Damian. You may call me Alfred.” 

"What about a grandmother?" Damian demands, climbing onto Bruce's lap before he can be stopped. He squints at the screens, full of far too complicated data for him to understand, but he tries. "I already have a grandfather. Now I have almost two, but I don't have a grandmother. I want one."

Bruce grabs Damian's hands to stop him from touching the keyboard. "We'll have to take you to meet Leslie this week." He glances over at Alfred, the look on his face as close as he'll come to begging. Alfred takes the hint.

"Come, Master Damian," he says briskly, lifting Damian up by the arms despite the boy's protests and setting him down on his feet. "I'll show you to your room and help you clean up for dinner. We'll be eating shortly."

Damian follows Alfred to the elevator but stops in front of the open door, fidgeting in hesitation and turning back uncertainly. "Father? Why aren't you coming?"

"I'll be up in a few minutes," Bruce says without looking away from the computer screens. "I have some work to do first."

"But..." 

The boy's voice sounds so soft and lost that Bruce turns around, worried. Damian is watching him from across the cave with wide, hurt eyes and the same look he had on his face when he learned his mother wasn't coming to Gotham with him.

Bruce is faced with the staggering realization that he's a _father_ now. To a very young son who has been through more in his five years than most will in their entire lives, who has allowed himself to be taken away from all he's known because of his love and trust for his father.

Bruce turns off the computer. "Never mind, it can wait."

 

* * *

 

Damian points at yet another painting in the hallway, his other hand wrapped around Bruce's fingers. "Who's that?"

Bruce blinks at the grey-haired woman in the painting, drawing a blank. He's never been _quizzed_ on these portraits before. "That's..."

"Your great-great-aunt, Master Damian," says Alfred promptly. "Elizabeth Wayne. She was a professor of history; our library contains several of her books."

Damian points at the next painting. "What about him?"

"Solomon Wayne, your four times great-grandfather. He was a judge, and did many notable things for Gotham City. His life is a long story to tell, it's best left for another time."

"What about—"

"Alfred will take you through a proper tour of the house tomorrow and tell you everything you want to know about the paintings," says Bruce. "All right, Damian?"

Damian doesn't look happy about it, but he nods and stays quiet. At least until they turn the corner.

"That's you, Father!" says Damian, standing on his tiptoes to get a better look at the framed photograph. "Who is that with you?

"Dick Grayson. I took him in as my ward after his parents died, and he..." Bruce falters and clears his throat. Like the paintings, it's a story to be explained later. "He doesn't live here anymore, but you'll meet him soon."

A frown flits across Damian's face as he looks at the older boy in the photo, but he's far more interested in something else: "What about the dog? What is its name? Does it still live here?" He tugs on Bruce's hand insistently. "I want a dog!"

 

* * *

 

Bruce nudges Damian forward. He's been worrying over this introduction since they arrived home, practicing it in his head and searching for an easy way out, only to find none. Best to just get it over with quickly and hope for the best.

"Damian, this is Tim. Tim Drake. He’s a… student of mine, and he helps me with my mission, as Robin. He's staying with us while his father is in the hospital."

"Hi there, Damian. It's nice to meet you." Tim flashes a friendly smile, kneeling down and extending his hand for Damian to shake. "I'm sure we'll be good friends in no time, won't we, little buddy?"

Damian scowls at Tim’s hand like it’s an affront. "Don't talk to me like I'm a baby. I'm not."

Tim drops his hand, taken aback. “I—“ he stammers, throwing Bruce a helpless glance. "I'm... sorry? I wasn't trying to."

Bruce sighs. He wasn't anticipating much better than this. Talia never told Damian about the others, about Dick or Jason or Tim, and Damian didn't come here expecting to share. Hopefully he'll warm to Tim soon. "Let's eat."

Damian scurries to steal the seat Tim is moving towards, the one on Bruce's right side. Before poor, confused Tim can take a single step Damian is already smiling smugly from the chair. A chair that he's much too short for—he can’t reach his plate and Alfred has to fetch a cushion from the sitting room to boost him up.

Tim clears his throat after nearly ten awkward minutes of no conversation, nothing but the clinking of silverware. "So, Damian, it must have been pretty... interesting... growing up with, uh, assassins."

"They taught me to defeat my rivals.” He picks up his knife and jabs it against the wooden table, testing its sharpness. "And how to fight with any weapon."

“Damian,” Bruce says sternly, and Damian puts the knife down. Bruce points at Damian’s mostly untouched plate with his fork. “Eat your vegetables."

"This food is bad. I hate it.” Damian pokes at the broccoli, nose wrinkled in disgust. Bruce is relieved Alfred is in the kitchen and didn't hear that. "Mama has a better cook. I want _those_ vegetables."

"Clear your plate or you won't get dessert. Alfred made blueberry pie, you don't want to miss that."

“I don’t care!” Damian exclaims, face flushing an angry, splotchy red, and shoves his plate away from him. Bruce hasn’t been a father much longer than a day, but he can already recognize the beginning of a tantrum. “I won’t eat this.”

“ _Damian_ ,” says Bruce, his voice verging on a Batman tone, so low and strict that even Tim ducks his head slightly, discomfited. “Your mother would be ashamed to see you behave this way. Stop whining and eat your food.”

The effect is immediate. Damian goes silent and sits up straight, looking at his father with wide, awe-filled eyes, then lowers his gaze in respect and picks up his fork.

“Yes, Father.”

Damian is quiet for the rest of the meal, not speaking unless Bruce addresses him and obediently eating everything on his plate without another complaint. He’s behaving, for now. But Bruce doesn’t miss how attentively Damian is watching, the annoyance that flickers across his face as he listens to Tim and Bruce talk and the way his eyes narrow every time Tim laughs or Bruce smiles.

Damian starts yawning during dessert, and by the time the dishes are being cleared away he seems to be having trouble keeping his eyes open. It’s been a long couple of days for him.

“It’s past Master Damian’s bedtime,” Alfred tells Bruce. “Perhaps you could take him to his room and help him get ready for bed. Make sure he brushes his teeth.”

“Fine.” Bruce stands and pats his drowsy son on the shoulder. “Let’s go, Damian.”

Damian yawns again. “Carry me!” he demands sleepily, reaching his arms up.

“Say please.”

He frowns as though confused, but does as he’s told. “Please.”

Bruce picks him up, and immediately small arms wrap around his neck possessively and a kiss is pressed against his cheek.

"I love you, Father," Damian declares earnestly. "Do you love me?"

Bruce forces himself not to flinch. It's a word he often finds himself avoiding, one he feels uncomfortable saying lightly. But he has a child now, and children as young as Damian need to hear it often. He’ll have to get used to it. 

"Of course I do. I love you very much."

"More than you love _anyone_ _else_?" Damian implores, raising his voice enough to be heard across the room by Tim, who is helping Alfred clear away the last of the dishes. He glances pointedly at the older boy. Tim pretends to be very focused on the plates he’s stacking and hurries into the kitchen, but not fast enough to hide the pinched frown on his face.

Bruce shakes his head as he carries his son out of the room. This child is a handful in more ways than one. “It’s not a competition, Damian."

Damian pouts against his father’s shoulder. “I love _you_ more than anyone else."

"More than you love your mother?” Bruce asks, and Damian's eyes go wide in horror as he realizes what he just said. "Like I told you, it's not a competition.”

 

* * *

 

"Father? Father, I miss Mama.” Damian is standing in the doorway to Bruce’s bedroom, wearing flannel pajamas patterned with cows. "I don't want to be alone. Can I sleep with you?"

Bruce closes his laptop. “I’m not going to sleep for quite a while, Damian. I'm actually heading out into the city soon.”

“Why?”

“So I can watch over Gotham and protect its people,” says Bruce, pulling the curtains aside and searching the night sky over the city. No signal tonight, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t people who need his help. “Tim and I patrol most nights to fight crime. We keep the streets safe.”

“Oh.” Damian thinks about it for a moment, brow furrowed, and seems to come to a decision. “I want to go, too. I'm staying with you.”

“No, it's too dangerous. You're staying right here.” His hand on the back of Damian’s head, Bruce leads the boy back to his own bedroom, where he belongs. “I’ll find Alfred and ask him to read you a bedtime story. Good night, Damian.”

 

* * *

 

“I don’t want to sleep,” Damian protests, sitting on the edge of his bed with his arms crossed stubbornly. “I want to go fight crime with my father. I’m not— not even _tired._ ” A loud yawn breaks that sentence in two. 

“Be that as it may, sir, your father asked me to read you a bedtime story, and that is what I am going to do. Now, let’s see…” Alfred opens the cardboard box he just pulled out of storage and coughs. “I apologize for the dust. I had to prepare your room on rather short notice, and I didn’t have time to finish. These books belonged to your father when he was a child. I’ll set them up on a bookshelf for you tomorrow.”

Curiosity getting the better of him, Damian peers into the box of well-read, slightly yellowing children's books. He picks up a picture book with a cat on the cover, a much-loved volume with its corners crumbling from all the times Martha had read it with her son. Damian lets out an unimpressed _tt_ and drops it back into the box, then picks up another.

While he's busy, Alfred sidles over to the window and quietly closes the drapes to hide the glowing yellow signal that has appeared in the sky. 

“I want this one.” Damian holds up what must be the thickest book from the box. Alfred takes it from him and looks at the cover, frowning. 

“Oh, dear. Crime and Punishment? Are you certain?" he asks, flipping through the crackling pages. "I don’t believe this book belongs in here. It must be a mistake. Wouldn’t you like to take a closer look at the others before—“

“I want _this_ one.”

Alfred nods. “Very well.” He tucks Damian into bed and gets himself settled in the nearby armchair, but he's barely had time to crack open the book before Damian is crawling out of bed and onto his lap to look at the pages.

“I’m afraid this book has no pictures, Master Damian.”

“So?” asks Damian, eyebrows drawn together in a way that reminds Alfred very much of the boy's father.

Alfred keeps reading, and after a while he realizes that, amazingly, Damian is following the words on his own, squinting at the pages and mouthing the words silently along with Alfred. At least, he does for a chapter or so, until exhaustion finally gets the better of him and he falls asleep with his head resting against Alfred's shoulder.

 

* * *

 

"What do you think of Damian?" Bruce asks later that night. He and Tim have returned to the cave after a quiet patrol. Hardly a crime to be found, and Jim only turned on the signal to share some evidence from a current investigation.

Usually the more peaceful nights, the ones where he gets to spend time on the rooftops watching over the city, help him think and work out any problems he’s having, whether with tough cases or with conflicts in his daytime life. But tonight didn’t offer him any resolution, the city didn’t help clear his mind, and it’s made him uneasy—Damian brings too many problems for him to wrap his head around.

"He's a precocious young lad," says Alfred, setting down the usual tray of post-patrol snacks. "Quite demanding, perhaps more than a bit spoiled, and very particular about how he takes his tea. And, of course, completely enamoured with you, Master Bruce." He pours a mug of steaming coffee and hands it to Bruce. "I expected him to be much more different due to his... upbringing, but he seems like a rather normal little boy."

"He's not," Bruce says hollowly, soft enough that it goes unheard. He can't stop thinking about how he found Damian—splattered with blood, among all those bodies. How unaffected Damian seemed to be by the scene. Bruce has been watching him carefully, worried the boy was suffering from shock, but he seems... fine. Which worries Bruce even more.

He can't stop wondering how much death his son has been exposed to.

"Damian's an okay kid. Kind of a brat—no offence, Bruce. And I don't think he likes me very much," Tim is saying as he munches on a cookie. Alfred shoots him a reproachful look for speaking with his mouth full and he swallows hastily. "But hopefully we'll be friends once we spend more time together. I think he could use a friend."

"Be careful around him," says Bruce. He shouldn’t—it's not fair to Damian—but he has a feeling none of them know exactly what that boy is capable of.

"He's just a kid, though! I mean, I know he was raised by assassins, but—"

"Just be careful."

 

* * *

 

The next morning Damian requests a few things. An easel and paints. A trip to Disneyland. A puppy. A sword.

Bruce has no problem sending Alfred out to buy as many art supplies as Damian wants, but he doesn’t have enough time in his schedule to take Damian on a trip, at least not for a few weeks, and he has to say no to the puppy... for now. Damian seems to have his heart set on one ever since he found out, to his disappointment, that the manor _used_ to have a dog that he won't get to meet. And Damian, Bruce has already learned, is a very stubborn boy.

As for the sword, Bruce meets Damian halfway and gives him a small wooden practice sword under the condition he doesn't use it to hit anything he's not supposed to, particularly the furniture and Tim.

Damian looks down at it and scowls. "I wanted a real sword."

"Does your mother let you have one?"

"... Not _yet_ ," Damian admits reluctantly. "But she said she was going to soon. I'm ready."

“The training sword will serve you fine for now. You’ll have a real one when I'm convinced you can handle it properly." That'll be.... when he's eighteen, probably. 

"I can convince you _now_. I challenge you." Damian points his sword up at Bruce. His round face is solemn. Bruce can't help giving a small smile at his very serious, oddly endearing young son. He pats Damian's soft head.

"We'll spar this afternoon, Damian. I have a meeting I'm already going to be late for." Bruce turns to go and gets jabbed sharply in the leg. It... _hurts_ , quite a bit. He frowns down at the boy, who is frowning right back at him, sword still held out threateningly.

"You promise?" asks Damian, eyes narrowed skeptically.

"I do," promises Bruce. It's worth it to see his son smile.

 

* * *

 

It's Damian's first day in his father's house and he's determined to explore it top to bottom. The house is big, but since it's all going to belong to him one day he should become familiar with it.

This is an old house, but not old like his mother and grandfather's mountain strongholds and desert bases. The floors are wooden and creaky under his feet, the windows reach as high as the ceiling in some places and most of them are covered up with long, dark curtains, and there are big, glittering chandeliers hanging from the ceilings. One of them is in a room that looks like a ballroom, like he’s read about and seen in paintings. He wonders if his father hosts parties with dancing. The other homes Damian lived in never did, the al Ghuls receive very few guests. 

This house reminds him of one he lived in with his mama. He was young then, only three, and they only stayed there for one summer, so he doesn't remember it well, but he remembers the grand staircase with the shiny, curving railing that Mama would never let him slide down.

There's nobody here to stop him sliding down _this_ staircase railing, and that's what Damian finds strangest about this house--how empty it is. He's used to having dozens of servants hurrying around, guards and nannies and tutors and all the people working for his mother. But here, now that Bruce and Tim are out for the day, the only people in the house are him and Alfred, who's been calling and searching for him for the past half hour. It's very easy to hide from someone in a house with this many rooms. 

There was a close call in the library, but Damian managed to sneak out the door while Alfred was looking underneath an armchair. He hasn't heard his name in a while, it's possible the old man gave up searching. 

"Master Damian! Get down from there this instant!" 

Or not.

Damian scowls and grumbles as Alfred pulls him away from the staircase railing he was climbing onto and sets him on his feet. He was _so close_.

"I want to slide!” he whines, stamping his foot.

“It's far too dangerous. You might hurt yourself, and that wouldn't be fun, would it?” asks Alfred. “If you’re so intent on sliding, I can take you to the park today. The playground there will have a slide. Will that do?"

“Fine,” Damian says grudgingly. “But I get to slide as long as I want."

"Of course."

"And I have to come home in time to see my father. He made me a promise."

"I understand. In that case, you may have to cut your time at the park short so we can return before him."

"No. I'll slide as long as I want."

Alfred sighs with the air of someone used to dealing with this kind of unreasonable stubbornness every day. "Very well. Until then, come along and help me with the laundry."

"That's servant's work," says Damian, wrinkling his nose.

Alfred frowns, looking like he very much wants to say something but decides against it. “Then you may read quietly in the library until I'm done,” he says curtly. “But you must promise me you won't leave and get into trouble."

Damian crosses his fingers behind his back just in case. "I promise."

As soon as Alfred's footsteps have faded away, Damian closes his book and slips out of the library. He's still got some exploring left to do.

The rooms off the hallway around the corner are all empty, nothing inside but a few pieces of furniture covered up in sheets. He lifts up the edges of the sheets curiously to peek underneath and sneezes from the dust.

The next door opens to something unexpected. It’s a bedroom, and not one of the dozens of spare ones he’s seen. It’s a bedroom that _belongs_ to someone. There are posters on the walls. Some have cars and motorcycles and some have people Damian doesn't recognize playing instruments like he's never seen before, emblazoned with words that don't make sense together.

Schoolbooks are piled up next to the bed. A pair of scuffed sneakers lie on the floor and a jacket is draped over a chair. Damian tugs the jacket down and tries it on. It’s much too big. The sleeves are so long on him they drag on the floor, but he likes it. In the pockets he finds some spare coins and a piece of bubblegum so old it’s gone too hard to eat.

Something feels wrong, Damian realizes. Nothing in the room has a speck of dust on it, but it feels _cold_ , like nobody’s slept in here for a long time.

Damian wonders who this room belongs to. It can’t be Tim’s—Damian already snooped through his room, scoffing at the slovenly mess of dirty clothes and crumpled papers and stealing a Twinkie from the desk drawer snack cache he discovered. Damian’s never seen a Twinkie before, but after one bite of the cake he knew he’d be back to steal more.

Earlier he found another bedroom that confused him, with empty dresser drawers and mostly bare bookshelves. But there were pictures pinned up over the desk, and he recognized one of the faces—Dick Grayson, the boy he saw in that photo of his father.

Damian sits down on the bed and frowns at the room around him. If this bedroom doesn’t belong to Alfred or Father, or Tim, or Dick Grayson… Whose could it be?

"I see you're not one for keeping your word,” says Alfred disapprovingly from the open door. He puts down his basket of laundry and tugs Damian off the bed by the scruff of his too-big jacket. “I told you to stay in the library."

"I kept the promise! I'm not getting into trouble, I'm only looking,” Damian says indignantly as Alfred takes the jacket off of him. He crosses his arms and fights against it, but Alfred still has no trouble getting his arms out of the sleeves. "Whose room is this?"

Alfred hangs the jacket in its original spot on the back of the chair and spends a long time making sure it is draped just right.

"It belongs to a young man who is no longer with us,” is all Alfred says, in a tone that Damian is used to hearing from his mama—the one that always meant she wouldn’t answer anymore questions.

“Oh." Damian cocks his head, thinking. He smiles as he’s struck by an idea even more exciting than the identity of the room’s owner. "If he's gone, then I can have this room. I want it."

"No, Master Damian. You have quite a large bedroom already. You have no need for another."

"At Mama's house I had lots of rooms. I had a room just for my toys, and another for my lessons, and—"

"I think you can manage with one for the moment. If you need more rooms in the future, we can discuss it then. There are plenty of _empty_ rooms to choose from. I'd advise you to stay out of this one--your father won't be pleased to find it disturbed.” Alfred briskly straightens out the wrinkled bedspread Damian was sitting on. "Now, follow me to the kitchen. I'll fix you a snack before we take our trip to the park."

Damian casts one last intrigued glance backwards at the door as he hurries after Alfred. Later that afternoon, after they return from the park, he tries opening the enticing door again and finds it locked tight.

 

* * *

 

The sun hasn't set quite yet, but Bruce changes into the uniform as soon as he gets home. He heard about the mayor's kidnapping on the radio during his drive back to the manor—it's going to be a busy night.

He's two steps away from getting his hands on the computer keyboard when the chair spins around and reveals Damian sitting there. He's tiny in the big leather chair, his legs dangling far above the floor.

"You're not supposed to be in the cave," Bruce scolds, tugging down his cowl. He makes a mental note to not underestimate this sharp, attentive little boy. Damian must have snuck a look as he or Alfred set the password with the hands of the grandfather clock. Sneaky. Impressive.

"I'm here for our duel," says Damian. He starts to climb down from the chair. Bruce has to grab him and lower him to the floor to make sure he doesn't fall. Damian pouts up at him. "You said this afternoon. It's evening now."

Bruce grimaces. "I know. I... I was held up at the company today, and now I need to suit up and get back into the city." He kneels on the cold stone and puts his hands on Damian's shoulders, hoping he can make the boy understand how serious this is. "A man has been kidnapped. He's in a lot of danger and he needs my help. You can show me your sword fighting tomorrow—I promise I'll have time then."

Damian's lip wobbles. He blinks rapidly to hold back angry tears. Bruce braces himself for wailing, but it doesn't come. "You already promised," Damian says quietly. Bruce almost wishes he would throw a tantrum. Cry. Yell. The disappointed acceptance hurts more. It’s too mature of a reaction.

"I'm sorry, Damian." Bruce stands and boots up the computer. He can't waste any more time—a man's life is at stake. 

This isn't the only promise to Damian that he'll break. In the future he should avoid making any, big or small.

He opens the surveillance feeds to search for any clues the police might have missed. In the corner of the screen he can see Damian reflected, still standing behind him. "It's about time you started getting ready for bed. I’ll call Alfred to come down and get you.”

Damian doesn’t bother to wait. As his footsteps fade away another set echoes hurriedly down the stairs.

"Bruce!" Tim calls breathlessly as he reaches the landing. "I'm here. I came as soon as I heard about the mayor. Just give me a sec to change and I’ll— Oops, sorry, Damian. Almost ran into you there."

Bruce glances over in time to see Damian glaring daggers at Tim's back before he disappears up the twisting stairs.

 

* * *

 

Damian ducks and twists out of the way. He's surprisingly quick for having such short, chubby legs—quick enough that he manages to slip through Bruce's legs to dodge the next swing. Bruce spins around too late to block the wooden sword that jabs his thigh at the exact spot that would sever his femoral artery if the weapon were sharp. 

"You're dead," Damian announces proudly. "Mama is a lot better than you. I can't beat her yet."

Bruce frowns thoughtfully. "Is that so..." Naturally, he had decided to hold back quite a bit, moving slowly enough to give Damian the upper hand... although not as much as he thought he would need to. Damian has clearly had a lot of training.

He assumed that as an encouraging parent he should let Damian win most of the time, but that must not be how Talia was raising him. She'll no doubt be displeased. Still, winning makes Damian so happy that Bruce can't believe it could be bad parenting.

That happiness instantly drains from Damian's face when Tim calls over to them from the computers. "Bruce! I think I managed to crack this code, come check it out!"

Impatient to finally solve this case, Bruce hurries over and reads the scrolling information over Tim’s shoulder. He nods. “Yes, this is promising data. Good work, Tim.” He becomes engrossed in the data on the screens and loses track of time as he makes connections in his mind and fills in blanks, until a question startles him.

"Who's Jason Todd?"

Bruce and Tim whirl around to see Damian standing in front of Jason's memorial case. He's looking up curiously at the costume inside. Tim glances at Bruce nervously, knowing what a sensitive subject it is. 

"He was Robin before Tim," says Bruce, his voice betraying no emotion, as calm as if he's talking about the weather.

There's a tense moment in which they anticipate Damian's demands to know more about Jason _right now_ , but he doesn't ask. He moves on to the next glass case and points at the costume inside.

"Who is this?"

"Barbara," says Bruce. "She used to be Batgirl. You’ll meet her soon enough.”

Damian spends a moment just looking at the costumes, head tilted to the side, while Bruce and Tim return to sorting through their data. Then Bruce feels a tug on his sleeve.

"Well?" Damian says impatiently.

"Sorry?"

"Do I get my sword now? I showed you how good I am."

"Oh. No. Definitely not. Not until you're older."

“But—!" he starts to protest.

"I'm not arguing with you about this, Damian," says Bruce with finality, turning his attention back to the computer. Damian huffs, and a minute later Bruce hears him beating the stuffing out of the training dummies with his wooden sword.

 

* * *

 

Damian sneaks down to the cave when it’s empty and sits in his father’s big chair in front of the computer. He lets himself spin the chair _once_ (twice) and then gets down to business.

He saw how impressed his father was with what Drake accomplished on the computer. How proud. It’s still bothering him, especially because he’s perfectly capable of doing whatever Drake can do, he just needs a chance to prove it. So he starts hacking into his father’s computer with the intention of finding something his father is working on, some unsolved mystery, and finishing it. Also deleting Drake’s work while he’s at it—or better yet, sabotaging it. 

His chin is barely higher than the edge of the desk and the chair doesn’t adjust up, which makes it hard to reach all the keys, but he can reach the ones he needs. He’s only just hacked his way past the main login screen when an odd green face appears in the corner, accompanied by a woman’s voice. 

“Batman, I—“ There’s a startled pause. When the voice returns it sounds confused, almost wary. “Batman? Is anyone there?”

Damian lifts up his arm to wave. “Hello.” There’s the mechanical sound of the little camera above the computer adjusting down. He peers up at the lens.

“You must be Damian,” the woman says. She doesn’t sound too pleased. “Is your father around?”

“Yes, I am. And no, he’s not. Who are you?”

“I’m an ally of Batman. You can call me Oracle, for now.”

“That’s presumptuous.” Damian says the big word slowly to make sure he gets it right—he only learned it that morning, from Alfred. Suddenly, he sits up straighter, intrigued—maybe she _is_ an oracle. “Can you tell the future? I want a prophecy about me like all the ancient heroes get. A good one.”

“I don’t tell the future. But I predict that you’ll be in a lot of trouble in the very near future for messing with this computer.”

He frowns in disappointment. “I wanted to know about me becoming Batman, or conquering the world like Alexander the Great.” He thinks for a moment, swinging his legs, and adds, “Or if my father will get me a dog soon.”

The green face doesn’t seem to care about that. “How did you access these systems?” she asks instead, disapprovingly. “I’m certain Batman wouldn’t let you touch the computer without supervision, and I’m _certain_ he wouldn’t leave himself logged in accidentally.”

“I know a lot about using computers.” One time he heard his tutor bragging to his mother that he would be hacking into NORAD by age six, at the rate he was learning. He doesn’t know what that is, but it makes him feel proud. He leans back in the chair and steeples his fingers. “If you have business with my father, state it now. I can speak on his behalf.”

“I think not. I’ll try his pager instead.” The computer screen start to waver oddly, like there is interference. “I’ll be locking you out in the meantime. Have fun with something a little more age-appropriate…”

“No!” Damian protests as the green face disappears and the screen changes completely. 

It turns into a maze with a yellow dot being chased by colourful ghosts. A sort of game. No matter what commands he tries, he can’t figure out how to make the game go away and sneak his way back into the systems, but he does figure out how to make the yellow dot move, and after that it’s impossible to stop playing until he wins.

 

* * *

 

"A bit of bedtime reading, Master Bruce?” chides Alfred, stepping into the dark bedroom. The only light comes from the reading lamp next to Bruce’s chair. "I do hope it _is_ bedtime reading, since that implies you will be getting some sleep soon, like I asked you to several hours ago. I was just on my way to make breakfast, but perhaps you would prefer a bedtime snack."

“What?” Bruce looks up from his book in alarm. It can’t be morning already, can it? He squints at the clock on his bedside table, impossible to read in the dim light. The thick curtains are closed tightly to block out any light from outside. Alfred strides over and Bruce winces in advance, expecting to be blinded by bright sunlight when the curtains are thrown open, but it doesn’t happen. Alfred isn’t feeling that cruel this morning. “I just got caught up— I couldn’t stop thinking about…”

“Child psychology?” Alfred finishes, picking up one of the books from the stack beside Bruce and glancing at the title.

“Damian,” corrects Bruce, putting down his own book and leaning back, feeling all his exhaustion hit him at once. "Did you know he recently decided he’ll only speak to me in Arabic if Tim is in the room? He knows Tim doesn’t understand it. I told him that’s rude, but he won’t stop. And he’s only going to keep acting out, in worse and worse ways.” He rubs at his tired, dry eyes with the heel of his hand. “I don't understand him. I... I don't know how to be a father to him.”

"I imagined it was something you have a bit of experience with. You've been a fine father figure several times already."

"None of them were as young as Damian. Jason was a teenager already, and as independent as an adult. It was easy with Dick because I knew what he needed. Tim still has a father. It's different with Damian. He needs me to be a regular father, not a father _figure_ , not a mentor or a partner in fighting crime...I don't know when to be strict and when to be lenient, I don't know how much attention he needs or the right way to talk to him... He's so _young_."

And that’s the biggest problem, Damian’s youth. Dick had been young at first, but not like Damian. Bruce doesn't spend time with children that young except when he's rescuing them, and in those situations he usually hands them off to their parents or the police minutes later. He loves Damian, and the way Damian _needs_ him, but it terrifies him at the same time.

Alfred tuts sympathetically. "I understand your concern, Master Bruce. But reading up on scientific studies isn't going to help you understand your son. If you must look for answers from a book, at least try a parenting book instead. Although any advice they provide could just as easily be learned by spending more time with your son."

"I'm worried,” admits Bruce wearily, dropping his head into his hands. "Worried I'll make too many mistakes. That I’ll ruin him, somehow. He deserves a perfect childhood, but I don’t think I can give him that."

"You'll do fine. I'll keep an eye on you and step in if you're raising the lad to be a spoiled brat,” Alfred says as he squeezes Bruce’s shoulder supportively. Without being asked, he stacks the books and picks them up to carry away, so Bruce won’t be tempted to start reading again. “I’ll take these back to the library. You really should get some rest, Master Bruce. I believe you promised to take Master Damian hiking up the road to the lighthouse this afternoon.”

 

* * *

 

“You know, Damian..." ventures Tim as they walk down the narrow, rocky path, on their way back to the main cave from the bat sanctuary. Damian wanted to see the bats. They’re not much of a sight during the day, just a rustling, sleeping crowd of fuzz and wings up on the dark cave ceiling. But it's becoming pretty clear that what Damian wants, he gets. Or else. "I used to wonder what it would be like to have a younger brother—"

“You’re not my brother," Damian snaps.

“I know that. I know we’re not related," Tim sighs and rubs the back of his neck thoughtfully, trying to explain in a way the kid will understand. "I only meant… Ever since I became Robin, Dick has almost been like an older brother, you know? Someone I can talk to, ask for advice… And I’m hoping we can have a similar relationship." He gives a forced smile that only makes Damian scowl more darkly. "I know you— uh, we haven't gotten off on the right foot, but I do want us to be close.”

“You’ll never be my brother. You’re my _rival_.”

“What?” asks Tim, taken aback. He shakes it off in time to grab Damian by the collar when the boy slips on a wet patch of stone—he could've fallen off the path into the river. "Careful."

Damian shoves Tim’s hands off of him. “You’re trying to take my place at my father’s side," he accuses, his hands clenched at his sides. “He’s _my_ father. You have your own father—stay away from mine!”

Frustration growing, Tim finds himself raising his voice. "Damian, I'm not trying to—"

"I deserve to be his apprentice!" Damian yells back. "Not you!"

 

* * *

 

The door to Bruce's study creaks open. Bruce looks up from his papers and doesn't see anyone standing there. But he hears the pitter patter of small feet scurrying around the desk.

"Hello, Damian."

"Look, Father," orders Damian, standing beside Bruce's chair. Bruce finishes signing and dating a form before glancing over. When he does, he immediately closes his eyes—he feels a headache coming on. "Father. I'm Robin."

Damian is wearing pieces of Jason's uniform, the one that's supposed to be kept safe behind glass. The tunic is big enough to look like a dress on him. The cape pools around his feet and drags along the floor.

"Take that off right now, Damian," says Bruce sternly, leaning down to unclasp the cape and drape it carefully over his arm like something precious. "This uniform is off-limits. It was kept in that case for a reason. Where's Tim? He was supposed to be watching you."

Damian smiles brightly, the happiest he's been since he came to the manor. "Drake is gone," he says, sending a chill through Bruce. "I'm Robin now."

 

* * *

Tim is thankfully still in one piece when Bruce finds him sitting trapped on a ledge jutting from the rock face, halfway between the cave path and the dark river below. Other than skinned palms and a few scrapes, the only thing that seems to be hurt is his pride. 

"Damian started running away from me, and he’s a lot faster than he looks. I was worried that he’d slip and fall, or get himself into trouble,” he explains as Bruce uncoils the rope and feeds it down. "I hit a slick patch and went over, but I managed to catch onto this ledge. I asked him to get help, or throw me a rope, but he ignored me. That was over an hour ago.”

"I see.” Bruce tethers the rope around a sturdy stalagmite and gives Tim the signal to climb. Seconds later, Tim is hauling himself over the edge, his anger spurring him on to beat his record rope-climbing time in training. 

Tim already said that he was fine, but it’s still a relief for Bruce to see it for himself, up close. The way Damian smiled as he said Tim was _gone_ was unnerving. It reminded Bruce of exactly where his son had grown up, surrounded by murderers and killers-for-hire and his unmerciful, ambitious grandfather. The worst influences for a child to have.

But Damian didn't hurt Tim, he didn't try to. He didn’t help Tim either, but Bruce had feared worse. Bruce had jumped to the wrong conclusions. He immediately assumed the worst of his child, his five-year-old son. And while he should be relieved that Damian proved him wrong, all he can feel is a deep, gnawing guilt that he couldn’t trust his son, and that he still doesn’t, not completely. He can’t be sure what’s going on in Damian’s mind, what poisonous ideas he’s picked up, what he might do one day without even understanding how wrong it is.

Tim stares in disbelief at Damian, at the too-big tunic and its golden R. "What is he wearing?” 

Damian crosses his arms proudly and moves to stand closer to Bruce. “ _I'm_ going to be Robin now. You're not needed."

"You're way too young for that.” Tim looks pleadingly to Bruce for support. “Bruce, tell him.”

"He's right, Damian.” Tim smiles and Damian’s mouth hangs open in betrayal. “I won’t even consider letting you out on patrol with me until you’re much older, no matter how badly you want it.”

“I’ve been training to fight my whole life!” says Damian indignantly. “Has he?”

“Training is important, but it’s not a substitute for age. I can’t do my job out there if I’m worrying about you the entire time. When I was young, my childhood was taken away from me. Don’t be so quick to throw away yours. You should be having fun, not helping me wage a war.”

“Being Robin will be fun. It’ll be fun because I get to spend more time with you,” says Damian, so earnest that it feels like a knife through Bruce’s ribs. The boy has no idea, no clue. When Bruce doesn’t say anything, he gets frustrated and raises his voice. “Why do you spend more time with _him_ than _me_? I’m your son, not him. It’s not fair!” he yells shrilly, stamping his feet, his round cheeks flushed in anger. He’s come close to having tantrums a few times, over vegetables he didn’t want to eat and rules he didn’t like, but nothing like this. If he’s not calmed down soon he’ll flop down on the floor and start kicking and screaming. “I’ll be a better Robin than him, I’ll prove it! Stop treating me like a baby!”

“I will when you stop acting like one.”

The words are quiet, spoken calmly, but they seem to ring off the cave walls. They silence Damian immediately. He stares speechlessly, breathing hard from all his yelling and stomping around. Now his face is burning in shame, not rage. Even Tim looks shocked. 

Bruce sighs, and says more gently, “I haven’t been paying you enough attention, you’re right. Finding out I have a son has been a difficult adjustment. I’ve made a lot of mistakes, but I'm going to be a better father to you from now on. I promise that.” He’s aware of how hollow it sounds, with his bad track record of broken promises. "Now, apologize to Tim."

Damian wrinkles his nose. “Why?”

"You left him trapped when you should have gone to get help immediately,” explains Bruce. “Tell him you’re sorry and that you feel bad about what you did.”

“I don’t feel bad.”

“ _Damian_ ,” he admonishes.

“I won’t apologize! I don’t want to!” wails Damian. His eyes fill with tears that he hides in embarrassment by pressing his face against Bruce’s leg. He speaks in Arabic, so Tim can’t hear, his voice strangled and pitiful, “You don’t even care about me, you only care about _him_.”

Kneeling, Bruce strokes Damian’s hair and wipes the tears off the boy’s cheek with his thumb. “You know that's not true,” he replies in the same language. A moment of reassurance just between the two of them. It seems to calm Damian down.

Damian switches back to English. ”He called me a mean name,” he tells his father between sniffles, glancing at Tim pointedly.

"Tim?" Bruce stands and turns to the other boy. The moment he's not looking, Damian gives Tim a wicked, smug little smile.

Tim rakes his hands down his face and groans. ”Oh, come _on_ —"

"What did you call him?"

"I said... he was demon-spawn,” Tim admits reluctantly, unable to meet Bruce’s eyes. ”He was _ignoring me_. I was angry,” he tries to explain. “And he technically _is_ —“

"You should have better self-control than to let a five-year-old make you lose your composure like that. Apologize.”

“I'm sorry, Damian. I was wrong to call you that,” Tim says sincerely. He does look like he feels bad about it. Hopefully Damian is learning a thing or two about the proper way to apologize… Bruce has a feeling he hasn’t had much practice. Tim offers a tentative smile. “Are we cool?”

Damian responds with what might be a nod or might just be a dismissive jerk of his head. Tim gives Bruce a shrug and a look that says, _“See? I tried_.”

"Don't think you're off the hook, young man,” Bruce tells Damian, who seems to have already forgotten. “You still owe Tim an apology."

Damian's smugness quickly shifts into outrage, then despair. The tears return. He protests louder and louder, he denies and bargains. Getting an apology out of him is like pulling teeth. Bruce tries tactics he never thought he’d use in his life—threatening time-outs and no dessert. He reminds Damian that he only needs to say two little words, but the stubborn boy would rather suffer in any other way than spit them out.

"'M sorry," he eventually mumbles to his feet. It’s the best apology they can pry out of him and it will have to do, for now.

 

* * *

 

"Carry me!"

"You're a big boy, Damian. I can't carry you all the time," says Bruce. He holds Damian's hand tightly as the crowd around them gets thicker, but with the amount of jostling they could be separated any second.

"Ubu carries me whenever I want," Damian says, pouting. All around him are legs and strollers. He doesn't like it. His father is tall, he wants to be up there. "I can't see. I want to see better."

"Fine," Bruce relents, leaning down and lifting up the boy to sit on his shoulders. Damian crosses his arms on top of his father's head and rests his chin on them, content. He can see the lions now.

He heard Alfred and his father talking earlier—mostly it was Alfred talking, about how everything that happened could have been avoided if Bruce had spent more time doing father-son activities with Damian, while Bruce sighed and muttered in agreement. Then the next time Damian saw his father he asked if Damian wanted to go to the zoo.

He's never been to a zoo before, but he's seen lions. His grandfather took him on a trip last year to a hot, grassy place called a savannah and they saw a lot of animals. The lions were Damian's favourite. On that trip they got to see the animals close-up. Not close enough to touch them, which disappointed him greatly—he sulked for days about not getting to pet the lions—but a lot closer than he is to the lions now. 

His father is tall, but there are too many people between them and the overlook railing. All he can see are two lions lying in the shade. One of them stands to stretch and yawn widely, then walks out of view. Damian gives a frustrated huff.

"Where do the animals go when they're not visiting here?" he asks, tugging on his father's hair. It's not his real hair. It's curlier and more brown. The moustache on his face isn't real, either. 

Back at home he explained that he wanted to avoid causing a scene by going incognito. Damian still doesn't know what that word means, but he refused to leave the house unless he got to wear a costume too, so Alfred changed him into a sweater with bear ears on the hood and gave him a small pair of sunglasses to match his father's, which pleased him.

"The lions don't go anywhere," says Bruce. "They live in the zoo."

"Why?" asks Damian, brow furrowed. He thought the animals were just visiting the zoo, like he and his father are. He wouldn't want to live here. No wonder they look so bored.

"So we can study them and work harder to protect the ones that live in the wild."

"That's wrong. They should be in their _real_ home." Damian, slamming his fist against the top of Bruce’s head in outrage. Bruce hastily fixes his skewed wig. "Grandfather says humans are bad because they trap and hurt animals. Someone trapped the lions. We have to free them."

Bruce takes a moment to pick his words carefully. "They don't want to be freed, Damian. These lions wouldn't survive in the wild, they've lived in zoos their whole lives."

"It's _wrong_. The lions are sad, they don't like it here. We have to let them _go_.” He slams his fists against Bruce’s head again, with even more vehemence. “Grandfather and Mama said people are ruining the planet and it's our job as al Ghuls to stop them and save all the animals and forests because if we don't they'll be gone forever. I have to save the animals here. It's my destiny."

"Damian, listen to me," Bruce says patiently, but firmly. “Stop hitting me, it’s not nice. And those lions don't need saving. They're not sad, they're just—"

"Grandfather was right. People are bad. We have to get rid of them." 

Bruce looks aghast but quickly hides it. A mother with twin preschoolers heard Damian and is raising a judgmental eyebrow. He edges away from her, creating enough space for others in the crowd to fill and separate them. "Not all people are bad," he tells Damian. "And we can't just _get rid_ of them... That's... You don't want to hurt people, do you?"

Damian thinks about it for a while. "No. I want to make them go away so there can be more animals."

His father doesn't say anything for a long time. They eventually get jostled to the edge of the crowd, out of view of the lion habitat.

"Do you want to get ice cream?" asks Bruce, changing the subject.

"Yes." Damian smiles, pleased. A tribute is being offered to him, the recognized winner. He's won lots of arguments against his father so far.

Damian is given an ice cream cone that he licks happily as he sits on Bruce's shoulders, keeping him quiet until they're done their zoo tour. He accidentally drips sticky chocolate ice cream on Bruce's ugly wig—if Bruce notices, he doesn’t say anything.

 

* * *

 

"I like your hair," is the first thing Damian says to Dick when they meet. He reaches up to the long, dark ponytail like he wants to tug on it. "It reminds me of my mama. Her hair is long, too.”

“Thanks,” Dick says flatly, unhappy about being compared to Talia, whom he’s never liked. Bruce, looking on, forces himself not to smile. Maybe this will finally convince him to get a haircut. “My name’s Dick,” he says, offering his hand to shake. “It’s nice to meet you.”

Damian peers up at Dick, sizing him up. Bruce worries this is going to be like the first meeting with Tim all over again, another sibling rivalry. He can already feel the headache coming on. But Damian must have learned something from that encounter, because he accepts Dick’s handshake. 

”I know about you. You were Robin,” says Damian. "I'm going to be Robin one day and I'm going to be the best one, better than you ever were. You'll see."

"I've heard that before," Dick mutters with a faint smile, not looking too worried, but he humours the boy. "And what makes you so sure?"

"I've been training my whole life. I can fight you right now and show you,” says Damian solemnly, lifting his chin high and straightening himself up to his full height, which doesn't even reach Dick's hip.

"I'm sure you can. But it takes more than fighting skills to be a good Robin."

"Then what?"

Dick opens his mouth to answer but perhaps he feels Bruce’s gaze boring into the back of his head, imploring him not to encourage the boy, because he closes it again. He crouches down in front of Damian, elbows resting on his knees, and changes the subject. "So, Damian, what do you like to do for fun?"

Damian has to think about it for a moment. ”I like to draw."

"That does sound fun. Do you want to draw together? We can spread papers all over the floor and grab a whole bunch of crayons and markers. I'd like to see what you can draw, I bet you're really good."

“No,” says Damian firmly, dark eyebrows knitted together. He is very secretive about some of his drawings. One sketchbook in particular he refuses to show anyone else. “You don't get to see."

Dick nods, unfazed. ”Let’s do something else then. Do you want to go outside and play catch? It'll give us time to talk and get to know each other."

"Catch what?"

There’s a heavy pause. Dick turns his head to look accusingly at Bruce. "You're kidding."

Bruce frowns right back at him, crossing his arms. ”I've been getting around to it. These past few days have been busy."

"I bet you haven't taught him how to ride a bike yet, either."

"I know how to ride a bicycle," Damian pipes up.

"Yeah, but you haven't had your dad teach you how. It's a lot more special," Dick tries to explain. "It's... an important bonding moment for both of you."

Bruce clears his throat. “I think you're overstating—" 

At that moment, Alfred interrupts with news of the important call from Lucius Fox that Bruce has been waiting for all morning. He hurries to his study to take the phone call, smiling as he hears Dick insisting loudly that he can carry his own bags to his room, that Alfred doesn't need to bother, _really_. The same argument every homecoming.

Later, as he's planning what to do first with Wayne Enterprises’s new acquisition—a young company making very promising advances in textile engineering that he’s certain could be applied to his Batman suit—he glances out the window and spots Dick and Damian out in the garden, playing catch. He stands in front of the glass to watch. The glove Damian is wearing used to belong to him as a boy, Alfred must have dug it out of storage in some untouched closet. It looks a bit too big for Damian yet.

Damian throws the baseball with all his might and Dick catches it just in time to avoid a broken nose. It's close call after close call and Bruce frowns, realizing that Damian must be trying to _hit_ Dick with the ball, on purpose. He frowns deeper. But he supposes Damian will get the hang of it eventually.

Bruce places his fingertips against the glass, wanting to be out there with the boys. Damian is poking around in the hedges for the lost baseball and getting spooked by the annoyed birds that burst out of the leaves, and Dick is trying to help him search but can't stop laughing. Bruce wants to be out there, but he's worried of spoiling it somehow, as though he risks shattering that perfect picture by forcing himself into it.

He's content to stay here and watch his young son play, truly play, like the child he is.

Dick makes it all look so easy. He shows Damian the best way to hold the glove and to throw, and the boy _listens_. After a while he kicks off his shoes and shows Damian how to do double cartwheels on the grass, with plenty of flashy demonstrations that have Damian practically bouncing in excitement to learn how to do that, too. Bruce can’t hear them through the glass or read their lips from this distance, but he can tell what Dick is saying as he lays a patient hand on Damian’s head to still him. _One step at a time_. He’s done a better job of bonding with Damian in one hour than Bruce has in days.

He even manages to help Tim and Damian get along, when Tim joins then out in the garden. The three of them end up searching for frogs by the pond as the sun dips low in the sky, and Damian actually lets Tim see one of the frogs he catches, lifting it up so the older boy can get a better look.

Eventually, as the light outside becomes dim, the boys are called inside by Alfred. Bruce sits back down at his desk and makes himself a note to buy Damian the coolest bicycle he can find.

At dinner Damian insists on sitting between Dick and Bruce and hangs onto every word Dick says. Bruce can see the glow of admiration on his son’s face, growing brighter every minute. It could be enough to make him jealous, but he’s not. Much. This is exactly what he hoped for.

"You seem to have won Damian over quickly,” Bruce tells Dick during their pre-patrol equipment check, handing him the smoke pellets he’s finished inspecting.

Dick shrugs. “He’s a kid. And I’m good with kids, if you remember,” he says. He does a little juggle with the pellets as if to prove his point. “It’s easy. Just give a few piggyback rides and you’re automatically their new best friend.”

“It’s not that easy,” Tim disagrees, scowling at the grappling line he’s trying to untangle. “Not with Damian.”

"He'll stop being such a brat to you eventually.” Dick tousles Tim’s hair and takes the knotted cables from him to unwind them with practiced hands. “Don’t give up hope. I can tell he wants to be your friend, he probably just doesn't know how. But he can't keep up that prickly act forever."

Dick leans against the worktable Bruce is using, watching him assemble his utility belt. He tilts his head, trying to look Bruce in the eyes.

“Something wrong?” He can always tell.

Bruce keeps his eyes down, focused on loading the acid vials into their container. “I’m glad Damian likes you.”

“Not as much as he loves you,” Dick is quick to assure him. “You’re his father, he—“

Bruce interrupts, looking up. “That’s not…” He sighs, and makes Dick raise an eyebrow in alarm when he drops his belt with a clatter. He ducks his head, gripping the edge of the table as if holding himself up with it, his shoulders sagging. “How do I convince a five-year-old boy that the grandfather he admires is an international criminal who should be in prison?"

“It might not be possible. He might not be ready for that,” Dick says sensibly, like Bruce knew he would. “You'll only confuse him. I’m not saying you should wait for him to figure it out for himself, but… break the news carefully, if you decide to, and don’t expect him to understand right away. You’ll have to be patient.”

“The things that come out of his mouth… He has no idea…” Bruce shakes his head grimly. “He looks up to Ra’s al Ghul as a _role model_.”

“Then all he needs is a new role model. A better one who can teach him by example.”

“Or more than one,” says Bruce quietly, glancing at Dick in hope.

Dick smiles. “Yeah, or that."

 

* * *

 

There's music coming from somewhere in the house. 

Bruce shuts his laptop, frowning. The only music he's used to hearing is the quiet, staticky radio Alfred listens to in the kitchen while baking, or whatever music one of his boys blasts in their room, often when he's trying to sleep, and he has to ask them to turn down, please. (Jason was always the worst when it came to that.)

This music is different. Bruce follows the sound through the hallways until he tracks it to an unused room near the library. It used to be a parlour, he remembers, but now it's just storage for old furniture they don't need anymore—including a piano.

Damian is sitting on the piano bench, boosted up by a cushion so he can reach the keys, concentrating so hard on the song he's been plunking out over and over that he doesn't notice Bruce standing there. Bruce takes the opportunity to watch, a warm feeling of pride unfurling in his chest.

Damian is good. Better than most kids his age, Bruce can imagine. He's no master yet, and he hesitates and fumbles on a few parts, but every time he goes through the song he does it better. It's clear he’s had lessons and spends plenty of time practicing.

After another, nearly flawless, repetition of the song, Damian looks over his shoulder at Bruce. Maybe he was aware of his presence this entire time. "It's out of tune," he tells Bruce, pouting.

Bruce sits down next to him on the piano bench. “I'll be sure to get that fixed,” he says. Today, if possible. “I didn't know you played piano.”

“Mama wants me to learn lots of music.” Damian taps out a short but complicated tune with one hand. “I'm learning piano and violin and composition, but I don't have any of my tutors here to teach me."

Bruce aches to pick up the phone and arrange lessons with the best music teachers in Gotham. He imagines piano recitals, imagines Damian attending classes with other children and making friends his own age. Enrolling Damian in school, dropping him off in the morning and picking him up at the end of the day, helping him with science projects and watching him join sports teams. Everything he should be doing as the boy’s father to give him a happy life. Not a normal one, not with the parents he has, but as normal as possible.

If only it was that simple. He hasn’t even decided how to reveal Damian to the public as his son, afraid of how the media, all those relentless gossip magazines and nosy paparazzi, might treat his son. The spotlight is a harsh place, especially with the reputation he’s created around himself. He doesn’t want Damian affected by that. Not yet. Not unless he can figure out a strategy to deal with the scandal, a way to soften the impact.

Even if that wasn’t an issue, Damian is only five, and there are plenty of things five-year-olds don’t understand, or might forget. Like how important it is to keep quiet about their father’s double life as a famous vigilante. Bruce can’t take that risk.

"I guess I should buy you a violin, shouldn't I?” asks Bruce, trying to smile even as he’s being eaten away by guilt. He should do so much more. “Remind me to talk to Alfred about—“

"I told him, but the one he bought wasn't good enough. I made him take it back and he ordered me a special one."

"Good. Sounds good.”

Damian sits back, motioning to the keys. “You play a song, Father.”

Bruce shakes his head. “I can’t… I’m not very musical.”

“ _Try_.” It’s a command. 

Bruce cracks a smile, amused at how much authority his son possesses. He presses a few notes at random as Damian watches with big, earnest eyes. Suddenly he is struck by an old memory, one pushed aside and half-forgotten, but the feeling of the smooth piano keys brings it back.

“My mother—your grandmother—used to play sometimes,” he tells Damian. “During holidays, mostly. She only remembered a few songs from the lessons she took as a child. I think you and your grandmother would have gotten along very well.” He clears his throat to stop the lump that’s forming, then reaches over and pats Damian on the shoulder as he stands to leave. “You’re very talented, Damian. I’ll have the piano tuned and set up in another room. If you need anything, let me or Alfred know. I can even get you a different piano if you don’t like this one. Whatever makes you happy.” _And keeps him busy_ , a part of Bruce thinks guiltily.

“I need my tutors. It’s hard to do my lessons without them,” Damian pipes up before Bruce can reach the door. He spins around on the piano bench to look at his father. "I'm supposed to start learning Russian and German soon. In my history lessons I was learning about Napoleon, so I'm trying to read books in the library about his battles, but I don't have anyone to answer questions."

Bruce grimaces. Talia wanted to send a few of Damian’s teachers along with him so he could keep up with his studies, but Bruce refuses to let assassins into his home. Even the nannies Talia offered as additional help were trained killers.

“Damian, you don't need to worry about your lessons right now. You've only been here a few days, and your mother will be visiting at the end of the week. You can take a break from studying while you're here, it won't hurt.”

“But…” Damian protests uncertainly, balling his hands into fists on his knees. “I'm supposed to—“

"Why don't we watch a movie instead?" asks Bruce abruptly. It's the first thing that comes to mind, and he can tell it was the right one by the way Damian's face lights up, his tutors forgotten. "I can show you one of my favourite movies from when I was a young boy."

 

* * *

 

Damian freezes when he hears the scraping of the grandfather clock moving aside to open the entrance to the Batcave, paint dripping from his brush onto the carpet as he turns to look over his shoulder. It’s too soon for his father to come to the study. He’s not finished his painting yet. It’ll ruin the surprise.

But it’s just Tim. He goes back to painting.

“What the—“ Tim stares at the boy perched precariously on a footstool stacked atop an end table in order to reach the painting hanging over the fireplace. Damian has a paint palette in one hand and a brush in the other.

“Go away, Drake,” says Damian dismissively, looking at his paints and wondering if he brought enough green. “I’m busy.”

“I’m telling Bruce.”

“No! It’s not done yet!” shouts Damian, but Tim is already running down to the cave. Damian huffs in frustration and mixes together more green on his palette hastily. He needs to hurry and finish before Tim fetches his father.

But he’s not fast enough. Sooner than he thought, his father bursts through the secret door behind the clock, Tim on his heels.

“Damian!” 

"Father. I painted a picture for you.” Damian smiles proudly in front of his creation.

Scowling, Bruce grabs Damian off the teetering stack of furniture and lowers him to the floor. “So I see,” he says through clenched teeth, though he is very deliberately _not_ looking at what Damian has done to his parents’ portrait, like the sight causes him physical pain.

“It’s not done yet. I added you and me here,” Damian says, pointing at the bright blue and orange figures in the foreground. They don’t quite match the style of his Wayne grandparents, but in his opinion they look even better. The best he’s ever painted. “And I’m almost done painting Mama, too. I’m going to add Grandfather next. We’re all going to be together in the picture.”

“You were going to paint _Ra’s al Ghul_ next to Bruce’s parents,” says Tim, stunned. The corners of his mouth twitch like he’s trying hard not to burst out laughing.

Damian glowers at the other boy. “Grandfather is part of _my family_ —”

“Enough,” Bruce interrupts, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Tim, leave. I need to talk to Damian.”

Tim opens his mouth to argue, but thinks better of it and leaves the room like he’s told. Though he does it with a distinct air of smug satisfaction that has Damian tightening his hands into angry fists at his sides. This isn’t over.

Bruce sits down on the worn leather sofa in the study and pats the spot beside him. Damian takes the hint and pulls himself up onto the seat, worried by his father’s less-than-happy behaviour. Maybe he didn’t like the colours Damian used.

Frowning, Bruce stares at the painting for a long time, then sighs and drags his gaze over to Damian.

“Damian, what do you know about your grandfather?”

Damian tilts his head, confused by this question. His father is waiting intently, so he answers as best he can. “He’s very old and rich and powerful. And the best sword fighter in the world—except for me, someday. He knows a _lot_ about history, because he was _there_ for a lot of it, and he tells the best stories. The Lazarus pits keep him alive forever, but I’m not allowed close enough to see them.” He pauses to think. “Mama says he does bad things sometimes but he loves us very much. He does it for us. And to help the world. Sometimes he goes too far and does really bad things that makes Mama not want to see him for a while.”  

“Do you know what those bad things are?” 

“Once he tried to take control of the weather with a machine to make storms that would get rid of cities.”

Bruce nods, his jaw clenched. “Yes, I remember. I fought him to stop it. Your grandfather and I are enemies, Damian, because he does bad things to innocent people.” He takes a slow, deep breath. “He kills them. He’s killed many people and he would have killed countless more, if I hadn’t stopped him. I know you understand what killing is. You’ve seen it before, haven’t you?"

Damian remembers the bloody battle on the island. He remembers the broken, lifeless bird he found in the flower bushes under a window at one of his mother's summer homes, and the time he snuck away from his room and hid to watch a traitor's execution, even though he was forbidden. And, even though he can't recall his age at the time—he must have been very young—he remembers the mangled bodies of elephants that were found near one of his grandfather's secret bases, and his grandfather's rage as he hunted down the men who hurt the elephants and took their tusks. The mens' heads were put on big sticks and left out as a warning. Damian would climb up the biggest tree in the courtyard and squint into the distance to see them. 

He remembers a lot of things that he never thought much about until now.

“Yes," he says. He's seen killing before. He doesn't like it, but he doesn't know why it's such a big deal to his father, who's watching him closely with a look pained concern. His arm twitches up like he wants to reach out and hold onto Damian, but then it drops again.

“Have you ever…” Bruce starts, and then his voice fails and he swallows, looking ill. The question is left unasked. “Your grandfather believes in killing people to achieve his goals, but he's wrong. Killing is the worst thing you can do. It’s something you can never take back.” His gaze is intense and impossible to look away from. “Do you understand?

“I understand,” Damian says, trying his best to not show how confused he is. He doesn't want to talk about this anymore. “But do you like the painting I made you?”

“Master Bruce? I was told you may need help dealing with—“ Alfred stops dead and stares in horror at the painting for one fleeting second before he blinks and he’s back to his cool, composed self. “Ah. I understand completely.”

“Is there anything we can do?” asks Bruce.

Alfred smiles knowingly. “I couldn’t in good conscience give a young child paints unless they were easy to clean. I’ll take it into town once my scones are out of the oven. I’m sure I can find someone to get it looking good as new.”

Bruce looks up at his parents’ faces in relief. “Thank you, Alfred.”

“You don’t like it,” Damian realizes, his lower lip wobbling. “You’re mad at me.”

Bruce cups Damian’s chin gently. “I’m not mad, Damian. It was thoughtful of you, but you went about it the wrong way. Why don’t you make a new painting of your family on one of the blank canvases Alfred bought for you?”

“If I do that, you won’t be mad anymore?”

“I told you, I’m not mad. This is my fault, not yours. You’re a very gifted boy, and I’ve been keeping you cooped up here in the manor, away from your regular lessons, because I can’t…” He breaks off, shaking his head. “I thought since it was only for a week, you would be fine, but I was wrong. You need mental stimulation, I can see that. I know firsthand the kind of trouble a clever child can get into when left alone.” The last bit is said with a wry smile that twists itself into a conflicted frown as he becomes thoughtful, murmuring to himself, “What should I…”

Damian waits to be told that his tutors will be brought to the manor so he can resume his lessons in history and music and combat and all the other subjects he’s been sorely missing. He would like that. His tutors might not want to come all the way to Gotham, but he’s sure they will if his mother orders it. 

That’s not what his father decides. What he suggests is even better.

"How would you like to learn an alien language?" he asks, and Damian's eyes go wide. "I know a Kryptonian with plenty of time on her hands. She'll probably thank me for giving her a reason to get away from that farm. I also know an expert in Ancient Greek culture, if you’re more interested in that…”

 

* * *

 

Damian sits and waits by the front door, letting Alfred tie his shoes and button up his warm sweater, while Bruce and Dick argue in the next room.

"We'll be _fine_ , Bruce. Nobody's recognized me in Gotham since I was a kid, and even less since I went away to college and you got a new..." He trails off. The brief silence that follows seems louder than their voices. "If worst comes to worst, I'll just say he's one of my friends' kids." 

Bruce insists once again, more loudly, for Dick to at least put a wig on, but Dick just stomps out of the room, shaking his head. He stops in front of Damian and puts his hands on his hips, smiling. "You excited, kiddo?" he asks, ruffling Damian's hair. "Thanks for getting him ready, Alfred."

"It's my pleasure," Alfred says as he helps Damian put on his frog-shaped backpack. "Remember, Master Damian, I've packed you a juice box and a snack if you should get hungry before lunch."

"Animal crackers?" 

"Of course not."

Damian nods. "Good." Alfred tried to feed him those biscuits the day before, but Damian took one look at the poor lions and giraffes and elephants and vowed to never eat food shaped like animals, _never_.

Damian happily holds Dick's offered hand. He’s only known Dick for a short time, but he already likes him more than anyone except his parents, because Dick is cool—Damian learned that word from Tim. Dick is _cool_. He's an adult but he's more fun and doesn't tell Damian what to do. He’s the leader of a superhero team called the Teen _Titans_ , and Greek mythology is one of Damian’s absolute favourite things. He has long hair and a leather jacket, and a _motorcycle_...

...that is nowhere to be seen. Instead, sitting in the driveway, is the minivan that Alfred uses to take him to the playground. Dick is holding the keys.

"You drove here on a motorcycle," says Damian, pouting. He was looking forward to riding on it.

“Can’t put a carseat on a motorcycle." Dick opens the car door and Damian scowls at the sight of the accursed carseat. He doesn't care what everyone says, he doesn't _need_ it. “Hey, don’t frown, kiddo," says Dick as he buckles him in. "We’ve got a shiny credit card from your dad and all the best toy stores in Gotham to visit. This is going to be a great afternoon, you’ll see.”

The toy store Dick brings him to is far from impressive, it doesn't even compare to the some of the stores Damian has visited while accompanying his mother around the world on business. It does, however, have the biggest display of superhero toys he has ever seen.

There are shelves upon shelves of colourful superheroes Damian has never heard of before. Dick patiently tells him the name and powers of each one he points at, as well as some anecdotes not known to the general public. The best, of course, are the toys of Batman, his father. An entire aisle of frowning action figures with dark capes, and more accessories than Barbie, or so Dick says.

“I want that one.” Damian points at a box on the top shelf with Batman and a toy helicopter. Dick pulls it down for him and, upon closer look he sees the Robin figure packaged as part of the set and makes a face of disgust. “I don’t want _Drake_. Put it back.”

“Actually, I think that’s supposed to be me.” Dick’s voice is hushed so as to not be overheard by the family at the other end of the aisle. “Me, or…” He bites his lip, looking away from the grinning Robin in the box. “Yeah, probably me. That was my uniform.”

Damian squints at the Robin suspiciously. It looks familiar. “Is it Jason?”

Dick is taken aback. “What do you know about Jason?” 

“He was Robin and he died. His uniform is in the cave, and it looks like this.”

 “He was a really brave kid,” Dick says sadly, wistfully. “A hero. A good Robin.”

“I’m going to be better,” says Damian. He won’t die, either, because if he ever gets too hurt he can just use the Lazarus pits that are his birthright. But he doesn’t say that out loud, because it seems mean to gloat like that, even if the dead boy can’t hear him.

Dick’s face looks pinched. “Don’t bring him up around Bruce, okay?” he asks quietly. “It’s painful for him. He cared about Jason a lot.”

Damian feels a surge of jealousy. It’s bad enough that he has to share his father with Tim and Dick, but now this dead Robin, too? He doesn’t like the idea of his father loving anyone other than himself. Except perhaps his mother. But, still, his father should care about _him_ the _most_ , above all others.

He shoves the box up in Dick’s face. “Are you sure the Robin is you?” he interrogates. “I only want this if it’s you.” Another toy on the shelf catches his eye, and he points up at it demandingly. “And I want that one, too.”

Later, Damian is glad that they took the minivan. He wouldn’t have been able to fit all his new toys on the back of a motorcycle, especially not the huge castle playset he got, big enough for him to stand in its courtyard and walk inside the outer walls. Perfect for reenacting historic sieges with his action figures and stuffed animals.

They eat lunch at the dirtiest restaurant Damian has ever been inside. A woman with red hair and glasses is already sitting in the booth, waiting for them, a cup of coffee steaming in front of her. She introduces herself as Barbara, and Damian recognizes her voice immediately. He scowls.

“You’re the oracle who wouldn’t give me a prophecy.”

She rolls her eyes. “I told you, I’m not—“

“Come on, Babs,” urges Dick, smirking in amusement. “Give the kid a prophecy.”

“Fine.” She thinks about it as she stirs more sugar into her coffee. “I prophesize that… you will grow up happy and loved by your family. And you’ll be taller than Dick,” she adds, shooting him a smug glance.

“I thought it’d be about winning battles…” Damian mutters disappointedly. “But that’s okay. I like it.” Especially the part about being tall.

A waitress stops to drop off menus and take their drink orders. Damian is pleased to be given a special paper placemat and a pack of crayons. The restaurants he’s been to with his mama may have been nicer, with expensive food and fancy decor, but they never gave him _crayons_.

“And what’ll your son have?” the waitress asks Dick. He and Barbara share a startled glance and she almost chokes on her coffee.

 

* * *

 

Bruce delayed showing his parents’ graves to Damian. He wanted Damian to know his grandparents through stories and paintings and photos first, before he saw them as names on cold tombstones. But Talia will be arriving at the manor in the morning and if she takes Damian with her when she leaves there is no way Bruce can know, without any doubt, when he’ll see his son again. He might be running out of time. He can’t put it off any longer. So he bundles up Damian in a sweater, because the night is a bit chilly, and takes him to the edge of the manor grounds, where the graves wait in their secluded, peaceful spot by the rustling trees of the forest.

Damian holds onto Bruce’s hand as he introduces himself to the gravestones in a practiced, formal way, like they’re guests of his father’s. Then they’re both silent for a long time, watching the graves in the moonlight while fireflies float around them. Curious, Damian reaches out to catch the closest one, but the breeze snatches it and carries it away.

“They died when you were very young, right, Father?” asks Damian, returning his attention to the graves, and Bruce nods.

“I was eight, only a few years older than you are now.”

“Do you miss them?”

“Every day,” he admits. “It’s gotten easier since then. It was the worst at the beginning. I couldn’t stop feeling helpless and angry. And lonely.”

Damian squeeze Bruce’s hand tighter. Possessively. “You aren’t alone now." 

“No,” Bruce agrees. He hasn’t felt loneliness like that in many years.

“I would be sad if you or Mama died. But that won’t happen.”

Bruce frowns. But before he has time to consider whether he should explain the reality to his son or allow him this childish fantasy, Damian’s hand darts out with a predatory speed and nabs a firefly out of the air in front of him. He’s too quick and eager, with not enough control in his action, and the insect he only intended to catch ends up squished and killed in his fist.

He stares at the glowing smear on his palm. “Oh,” he says in dismay.

“Be more careful, Damian,” urges Bruce, a faint sense of unease sweeping over him as he watches Damian flick away the dead insect. Damian’s eyes, normally wide and blue and innocent despite all they’ve been witness to, look empty in the darkness, occasionally flickering luminescent green from the light of the fireflies.

 

* * *

 

The day his mother is due to visit, Damian can’t hide his nerves. Even though they've only been apart for a week—they've been separated for much longer in the past, when she went away on business—it seems like it's been an eternity. When they get word that Talia's plane will be delayed a few hours due to bad weather, Damian is so wound up that he nearly explodes in a hiccuping, flailing tantrum. It takes a hastily administered plate of cookies to calm him down. 

And that's only the first close call of the day.

"It's not right," he says, frowning at his bowtie in the mirror. "Fix it."

"I've retied it twice already, Master Damian. It looks perfectly fine.”

"It's _not_. It has to be perfect. Fix it!” And Alfred does, but afterwards Damian decides that the blue bowtie he’s wearing is all wrong and he wants to wear the red one instead.  

He's grumpy and fussy from being too excited to sleep the night before, and he can’t make up his mind about anything. He wants to wait in the sitting room, so Alfred can lead her in and their reunion can be made formally. No, he wants to wait at the top of the stairs in the entryway, so he can look dignified as he descends. No, he wants to wait just outside the front doors, so he’s the first thing she sees. 

But all of those plans fly out of his head the moment he sees the car pulling up the long drive. He runs past the sitting room, down the stairs, and through the front door, leaping into his mother’s arms as she steps out of the car.

She holds him even more tightly than he hugs her, murmuring in his ear how glad she is to see him again, how much she loves him. Damian presses his face against her shoulder and tries not to cry. He feels bad enough about crying earlier that day, and all the nights he's cried in bed missing her. He's determined to show her that he's strong. A big boy. And that means not crying.

But he can't stop the tears from rolling down his face when he looks up at his mama. Her eyes are swimming with tears and she's smiling. He loves that smile, it makes him feel like he's as bright and important to her as the sun.

"I've missed you," he blurts out between sniffles.

"If you only knew how much I missed you as well..." says Talia, gently wiping his tear-stained cheeks with her sleeve. She pulls him away at arm’s length and examines him thoughtfully, laying her hand atop his head. "I believe you've grown in this past week."

Damian swells in pride, standing up straighter and bouncing on his toes in the hope it will make him seem even taller. His mother smiles at him until something distracts her and makes her shift her gaze up, over his head. Turning around, Damian sees his father standing just outside the front doors.

Talia and Bruce regard each other. They don't speak or smile. Neither of them lifts a hand in greeting, and there's no movement made to close the distance between them. Then Bruce nods and Talia inclines her head in acknowledgment, her hair falling over her face as she turns her attention back down to Damian. It's not the embracing reunion Damian had hoped for between his parents, but there's still time for that. All that matters is that they're together now.

"You haven't caused your father too much trouble, I hope?" Talia asks Damian, tapping him lightly on the nose.

"I was good," he says. His mother looks at him, an eyebrow raised. The look that can see through anything, that makes him fidget nervously. "I _tried_."

He expects her to be disappointed with him, but she looks amused. She takes his hand in hers and leads him towards the path that wraps around the house.

"Walk with me in the garden. It's been too long since I've had the pleasure of seeing Alfred's award-winning roses."

Behind them the drivers struggle to unpack and carry all the presents she brought for him—an entire second car full. Toys and clothes and books and even some furniture for his new bedroom, including an ancient bronze shield like the one that hangs on the wall of his bedroom at his mother's house, Damian notices with approval, craning his neck to see. He hopes there's a sword too.

It's not a perfect afternoon to be out in the garden. The wind is chilly and pushes them along impatiently, and the grey clouds above threaten rain, but Damian wouldn't complain if they were walking in a hurricane. As long as he's with his mama, the rest doesn't matter.

Talia leans down and cups a blue rose blossom gently in her hand, breathing in its scent. "Flawless," she says. "I don't know how he does it. None of my gardeners can grow roses half as beautiful."

Seeing an opportunity to make his mother happy, Damian reaches into the rose bush and tries to pick one of the blue flowers, but the stem doesn't break as easily as he thought and all he ends up with for his trouble are pricked, bleeding fingers. 

Talia _tsks_ and pulls his hand towards her to make sure he's not cut too badly, frowning in concern. "Why would you do that? You know they have thorns."

"I wanted to pick one and give it to you."

She pats his hand. "That's a lovely thought, but we should leave the roses alone. Alfred works very hard on his garden and it would be rude of us to disturb it."

Damian sucks on his bleeding thumb, his brow furrowed in confusion. The manor belongs to his father, which means all of this, including the garden, belongs to _him,_ too. He should be allowed to pick as many flowers as he wants. But before he can argue this, his mama is striding down the path and telling him to hurry along. 

They sit on a bench in front of a bubbling fountain that looks old but isn’t—it's nothing compared to the enormous marble fountain at Damian's grandfather's house in the mountains, which is centuries old and big enough to swim in. Since he arrived here, Damian has found most of the garden a disappointment, except for the animal-shaped shrubs, and the roses now that he knows his mama loves them. There aren’t even any peacocks or waterfalls to make it less boring.

Talia wraps her arms around Damian and rests her cheek against the top of his head. Damian thinks he sees a dark figure watching them from one of the house's windows—it looks like the window to his father's study. But it must have just been a shadow from the clouds passing overhead, because he blinks and it disappears.

"You've been happy here?" Talia asks.

Damian thinks about the confusing week he's had, full of so many things new and strange. “Yes,” he answers. “I love Father. He's just like you told me in the stories." Worried, he looks up at her, adding, "But I still love you more."

"Oh, Damian. I couldn't be jealous. I want you to love your father as much as you love me,” she says, but Damian can see the pleased tug at the corner of her lips. ”I love him, too."

Damian beams, so excited he can barely sit still. He _knew_ his parents love each other. Soon they'll get to be a true family, like he's always dreamed of. He tells his mama about his time with his father, everything he's learned and seen and done. _Almost_ everything—he doesn't feel the need to tell her about the tantrums he threw, or how he was forced to apologize to Drake.

"... And then Father took me too a zoo. Do you know what zoos are? They're awful, Mama. I hate them. We _must_ tell Grandfather to get rid of them and set the animals free."

"I'll certainly let him know," she says distantly, playing with his hair.

”Is... Is Grandfather _bad_?” Damian asks uncertainly.

That snaps her to attention. Her fingernails dig into his scalp for a brief moment, before her hand drops away from his head. "What do you mean?"

"He killed people, and that's bad," says Damian slowly, trying his best to explain it right. "Does that make him bad?"

"Your father's been telling you that, hasn't he?" She doesn't wait for an answer. Her mouth twists in distaste as she looks up at the manor, like her glare will find him through the walls. “Of course he has. He can't help himself. He couldn't have waited until—"

" _Mama_ ," Damian interrupts, pouting. He asked a question but he's not getting an answer.

She sighs. "It's complicated, and you're so young..."

"I'm not a baby. I want to understand."

The wind blows her long dark hair across her face, and she brushes it aside, a faraway expression on her face. “I’m your mother, and even I have trouble understanding it. I’ll have my mind made up that I am finished with him, that I will never speak to him again, but my heart keeps bringing me back to him when he needs me. Your grandfather is not a perfect man. I won’t even go as far as to say he is a good man. But he is our family and he loves us, and, despite everything, I don’t know if I can ever stop loving him back,” she admits quietly, unconsciously touching a gold pendant hanging from her neck. They’re the only two in the garden, but Damian feels as though she isn’t speaking entirely to him. “I agree with his goals, but there are times, which seem to be occurring more and more frequently, that I cannot condone his methods, because they involve hurting and killing innocent people.

"Father said killing is the worst thing. You killed people…" He frowns and shakes his head at the memory of her plunging her sword into that bad man’s chest, only a week ago. ”But you're _not_ bad, Mama. Is Father wrong?"  

"You're starting to think like him. All black and white, good or bad,” she says with a ghost of a smile. Damian can’t tell if she’s happy or displeased. "Yes, I have killed, out of necessity. As you know, the family of al Ghul has many dangerous enemies, who won't stop seeking our deaths until they meet their own. If I didn't strike them down, I wouldn't be here right now, and neither would you.”  

Damian nods gravely. This makes sense to him, he’s heard it before. But then, why does his father insist differently? He has never known his mama to be anything other than correct and true, so his father _must_ be the one who is wrong.

Talia gestures towards the woods beyond the garden. "If one hundred assassins came bursting out of the trees right now, I would tear them apart before they laid a hand on you, and I wouldn't feel any regret. I love you more than anything in the world, my beautiful boy. I would do anything for you.”

“I would do anything for you, too,” says Damian without hesitation.

Talia presses his thorn-pricked fingers to her lips. They barely bled at all, and don’t hurt anymore, but she’s as gentle as she was when touching the rose petals. “Unless it causes you harm. Promise me that,” she says urgently. He does.

She unstraps a dagger from her ankle, one of several she often carries hidden on her body, and places it in his hands. It’s a practical weapon like any of their assassins might use, not a decorative jewelled piece. Sharp steel with a dark handle and a simple leather sheath. Small enough for Damian to wield easily. He knows how to use daggers. He had plenty of them when he lived with his mama, but he came to Gotham with few possessions and his father refused to give him any weapons.

Talia wraps Damian’s fingers around the leather and warns him to keep it hidden, that it will be confiscated if his father sees it. He swears that won’t happen.

She strokes his cheek lovingly. "Your father believes killing is unforgivable regardless of circumstances. Your grandfather believes in sacrifices for the greater good. I believe there is a difference between killing innocent people and killing those who do harm, a difference I hope you come to understand. Just as I hope that, if the day comes when I'm not able to protect you, you won’t hesitate to kill someone who means to kill you."

"Would Father be angry with me, if I did?"

"Your life is worth more than your father's opinion,” she tells him firmly, a fierceness in her eyes. It fades, and she tells him more softly, “He wouldn't be angry, no. But he would never forget. Your father is much stricter in his moral code than anyone I have ever met, and he cannot accept anyone that doesn't share his beliefs. That is part of the reason why he and I aren't together."

"But you _will_ be together. You're together right now, that's why you're here. You're going to stay and we'll live here with Father as a family."

"I'm not staying, Damian. I'm leaving tonight. You may come with me, if you wish. Or you can spend more time with your father."

Disappointment weighs in his chest like a stone, but he holds his chin high, refusing to cry. "I want to stay with Father longer, but..."

"What is it?” she asks urgently. “You told me you're happy here. Is that the truth?"

Throwing his arms around her neck, Damian clings as tightly as he can. ”Everything is different here. I'm confused so much,” he confesses. He doesn’t think he could keep his mama here just by holding onto her, but maybe he should try. ”I wish you would stay. I don't understand Father, and I keep doing things wrong."

Talia holds him and waits for a long time, until his grip loosens and she can slip his small arms from her neck. They sit in silence on the garden bench, a few thin drops of rain falling on them, until Talia finally speaks.

"I'll tell you a secret you're not supposed to find out until you're much older—your father isn't always right. Neither am I. We both want what is best for you, but due to our differences of opinion those are going to seem very different things. I worry that you will find it difficult, being our child.” She looks at him with a kind of sadness that only leaves him more confused. "Perhaps it would have been easier if you hadn't met your father until you were older, like I planned. But, who can say?"

 

* * *

 

"So, we're in agreement," says Bruce, his hands laced together atop his desk. "Alternating months."

Talia tilts her head obligingly. ”We'll try it." She pinches the cheek of the boy sitting on her lap. "Are you listening, Damian? You'll stay with your father for another three weeks, but I'll call and talk to you every day. If you decide you want to leave sooner, you'll tell me so I can come and get you. Right, darling?"

"Yes, Mama. I know," he says distractedly. He's busy playing with a wooden puzzle cube she brought him as a present, the likes of which Bruce has never seen before. His tongue sticks out in concentration as he twists the complicated pieces that bear symbols from several languages.

Bruce would have preferred to have this discussion with Talia privately, but Damian is determined to spend every moment with his mother while she's here and refused to be shut out of the study, and Talia is happy to indulge him. There are so many things Bruce wants to tell her, about their son— _their_ son, their _son_ …he still hasn’t gotten used to those words—and their son’s perfect face and constantly dirty hands and knees, and his moments of frustrating disobedience and moments of sheer brilliance. And about everything else between the two of them, everything that’s been left unaddressed over the years and left to tangle into impossible knots, but maybe they could _try—_

Except Damian is here listening and Talia is sitting tall and regal, a threatened mother with all of her shields thrown up in protection of her son. He can’t get through to her while she’s like this.

"Since Damian will be extending his stay here, it's important that his schedule stays as close as possible to what he's accustomed to,” Talia is saying with authority. “I will be sending a few of his tutors to stay in Gotham and teach him here in the manor during the day."

"That won't be happening. I won't allow agents of the League of Assassins into my home."

"Would you feel safer if they taught Damian at a different site? I can't imagine you would want him so far from your protection and security for so long each day. Or perhaps you'd like to supply your own tutors? I’m sure any civilians you hired would be as trustworthy and discreet as the sworn servants who have vowed to live and die at my command.” Her voice drips sarcasm. She waves a hand through the air patronizingly. “I suppose you could enlist more of your hero friends, the ones who already know your secret identity. They must have endless free time during the day that they'd rather devote to teaching our son the advanced curriculum he requires."

Damian holds up the puzzle cube, beaming. "Look, Mama. I solved it."

"Wonderful, my love." She kisses him on the forehead proudly, then takes the puzzle from him and scrambles it. "Now do it again, in under five minutes." He resumes spinning the pieces, even more determined than before, as Talia looks pointedly at Bruce.

She has left him no way to argue. He grits his teeth. "Fine. Send the tutors. But there won’t be any lessons in combat or weapons."

"Would you have our son grow up not knowing how to defend himself?” asks Talia, calmly challenging.

“I'll be teaching him that myself,” Bruce says, and he can tell by the way Talia’s eyes light up that he’s told her exactly what she wanted to hear. Damian, too, can’t hide his eagerness. He stares at Bruce like he can scarcely believe his ears, the puzzle forgotten. “Strictly self-defence, and nothing too rigorous. He's still only a child.”

"You swear to set aside enough time each day for lessons?” Talia presses.

"Barring emergencies, yes."

She places her elegant hand on top of Damian’s head. “Promise him."

"I promise, son.” Bruce meets and holds the boy’s wide-eyed gaze. “I'll make sure you learn everything you need to know to protect yourself."

"Thank you, Father. Will you train me to be Robin, too?” He twists in Talia’s lap to look up at her, his face shining in excitement. “I’m going to be Robin one day, Mama. Father said I could when I’m older. Did I tell you?”

She shakes her head. “You didn’t. We’ll talk more about this later.” She says it to Damian, but she’s looking straight at Bruce. Her smile is tight. “Now, the matter of when you'll legally declare Damian as your son."

Bruce blinks, stunned. This can only be revenge for letting Damian aspire to be Robin, with the pleasure she’s taking in it. "When I decide it best,” he says simply.

“Any further delay is cruel and unfair to Damian. You cannot keep hiding him in this house like a secret, and you cannot call yourself his father without acknowledging him and giving him the legal security he deserves as your son and heir.”

“He’s not my only heir,” Bruce reminds Talia. She frowns in displeasure, pulling Damian closer against her. “And his security is my greatest concern. I have my best PR people working on strategies to minimize the press when I release the news. The reporters and paparazzi are going to be relentless—it will be months before he’ll be able to set foot in the city without them swarming him. And the media won’t be the only ones targeting him. Dick has been kidnapped for ransom before, it won’t take long for—“ He stops himself, remembering that Damian is sitting there, listening to every word. He doesn’t want to frighten the boy. “Preparations are needed. I’m not taking this lightly.”

This time Talia is the one forced to concede, and fumes in silence. She and Bruce watch each other warily, and it feels as though there’s a battlefield separating them instead of just a desk. Bruce wonders—is it always going to be this way, from now on? Arguing and compromising on every aspect of Damian’s life?

“Damian, run along and tell Alfred I _will_ be staying for dinner, after all,” says Talia, lowering him down off her lap. “And then go wash up. I’ll come find you shortly.”

He scurries out of the room, his eyes still glued on the puzzle in his hands, seeming every bit the obedient son. But as he closes the door behind him, Bruce spots the sly little glance he casts over his shoulder. He’ll soon be finding out the study doors are too thick to hear anything through. Bruce should know—he tried to listen in to this room plenty of times as a child, with no luck.

Talia makes sure the door is closed tightly and locks it for good measure. She slowly turns back to face Bruce, her voice soft and dangerous.

“You told our five-year-old son he would be Robin someday?” 

“Not in so many words, but that was the only answer he would hear. He sees it as his birthright—I don’t have to guess who taught him words like that." 

“But it’s not an empty promise, is it?”

“He has potential—” Bruce admits with reluctance. Talia interrupts him heatedly, slamming her palm against the desk.

“I cannot believe you would even consider this! Especially after what happened to the last boy…”

Bruce goes rigid, his face turning to stone. Talia realizes while speaking that she’s gone too far. She glances away from his eyes in guilt and sits down in her chair so she’s no longer looming over him.

“I’m not forcing Damian to do anything,” says Bruce tiredly, rubbing his forehead. “Even if I forbid him from ever becoming Robin, I’m sure he’ll find a way to fight crime on his own in a few years, if he’s determined enough to help the city. He barely listens to me now. I can’t imagine that’s going to improve as he gets older.”

He can hope Damian will never want to be Robin badly enough for that to happen, but it’s a slim hope. He sees all the right qualities in Damian—the stubbornness, the eagerness to make Bruce proud of him, the willingness to fight for what’s right, even if he doesn’t have a firm grasp of what that is yet. And Bruce knows Talia has seen the same things. Her worried face says it all.

“Damian has greatness in him. I’ve known that since I first looked into his eyes,” says Talia. “He’s going to change the world. There are things I want him to learn from you—your bravery and goodness— but one thing he’ll never be able to learn from you is self-preservation. I want him to be brave and good, but I can’t bear to stand by and watch him become as self-sacrificing as you. I won’t allow it. He’s my _son_. I want him to _live.”_ Her eyes are fierce, but sad. _“_ I wish I could have kept you from him until he was older.”

She doesn’t say it with malice, more with exhaustion, almost as a sigh, but it hurts more than anything she has ever said to him. Bad enough that he has already missed five years of his son’s life—years that Talia has _taken_ from him—but the thought that he might have missed more, that he might not have met Damian until he was older, maybe a teenager or even an adult, and he would never have known the round-faced boy who likes to sit on his shoulders and asks questions like why the earth only has one moon when other planets have more, that hurts like a twisting knife.

And the thought that Talia might still take Damian away and try to hide him again, that stirs an anger within him. He won’t let it happen.

“A week ago you asked me for help because our child, the child you had never told me about until that moment, was in danger while in your care,” Bruce says as calmly as he can manage. Talia frowns and starts to say she regrets ever sending him that distress call, but he speaks over her. “And now you’re accusing me, prematurely, of putting his life at risk. I remember where I found him. How I found him. Surrounded by dead bodies because of _your_ enemies.”

“I protected him,” she insists. “I’ve kept him safe.”

“Physically safe, only barely. But sights like that affect a child in deeper ways. Emotionally, mentally…” Bruce knows all too well.

“Damian is fine. I would be able to tell if he wasn’t. He’s resilient. He’s—“

“Used to it?” he interjects. “How much death and violence has that child seen, that he’s become so jaded? How much, Talia?”

Abruptly, she stands and turns away, and for a moment Bruce thinks she’s going to storm out of the study, that he’s angered her so much that she’s going to leave and take Damian with her. He gets to his feet to stop her, but she moves towards the window, not the door. Wrapping her arms around herself, she looks out at the darkening sky and her reflection, weary of fighting, in the glass.

“I’ve shielded him from it as best I could.” She glances over her shoulder at Bruce. “It wasn’t easy. That danger will always be a part of my life. The only way I could spare him of it would be to send him away from me—from _both_ of us—forever and pretend he never existed.” Her voice is hardly more than a whisper, as she confesses, “I tried that, after he was born. I tried to give him a safer life. But when the time came I couldn’t let him go. I was too selfish.”

Bruce stares in shock, laying a concerned hand on her shoulder lightly, before he realizes what he’s doing, and quickly removes it. He had never imagined… 

Like Talia, he’s tired of fighting. It’s too late to know if Damian would have been happier as part of a normal, anonymous family, but surely the two parents he has right now can give him an easier childhood by not arguing between themselves.

“Talia… Stay here, with me and Damian,” implores Bruce. “For a few days. He wants you to—it would make him happy.” It would make Bruce happy, too, but he can’t bring himself to admit it. Not to her and not to himself.

Talia shakes her head. “Thank you, but I’ll be staying for dinner and no longer. My father is expecting me tomorrow.” She touches the side of his face and kisses his cheek, her lips landing perilously close to the corner of his mouth. “I trust you’ll take good care of our son, Beloved. If not, I will know.”

 


	2. Chapter 2

"Master Bruce,” exclaims Alfred in shock, fumbling the tomato he was about to slice and almost dropping it on the floor. "What is  _that_?"

"Damian's been asking for a puppy since he got here. And now that he's staying longer, it seemed like a good idea,” says Bruce. The dog squirms and starts whining at the food on the counter. "Quiet, boy,” Bruce shushes, pulling him back by his collar. He wants the dog to be a surprise for Damian.

Keeping Damian cooped up in the manor grounds has been weighing heavily on Bruce, though it isn’t as bad now that Damian’s tutors come daily to occupy him with lessons. Bruce has been keeping a close eye on them when he has the time, but he hasn’t noticed anything troubling, and if the tutors are aloof and quiet towards him and Alfred, they’re clearly fond of Damian, some of them having known him from a baby.

The one that comes most often is a tall woman with an accent that’s impossible to place precisely, whom Bruce is certain he has faced at one of Ra’s hideouts before, and teaches Damian everything from languages to science to art. Another, a scarred young man, only teaches outside and only on sunny days, never with a book in sight, spending much of the lessons trying to get Damian to meditate out in the garden, which the boy always grumbles about afterwards. There’s also an elderly man who never says a word and only seems to play silent games of chess with Damian, for hours at a time. A few other tutors Bruce hasn’t had the chance to observe, but Alfred has told him that they’re just as eccentric and seem no more untrustworthy than the others. Bruce might not understand the complicated curriculum Talia has set up, but Damian seems to enjoy his lessons, and that’s good enough for now.

Even though Damian has his tutors now, that’s not the same as having playmates his own age. Tim is too old to be the kind of friend he needs, and their relationship is still strained at best. A dog is the perfect solution until the day Bruce can finally introduce Damian to some other children.

"A splendid idea. I very much look forward to training, feeding, and cleaning up after him,” Alfred says dryly, but takes pity on the dog and feeds him a slice of ham. “Of all the breeds to choose from, you simply  _had_  to get him the largest one you could find. Master Damian will be able to ride this creature like a horse in a few months' time. I shudder to think of the destruction he'll be able to wreak around the house, and my  _garden_ , if he feels so inclined."

“It... seemed like a good fit,” says Bruce, looking down at the gangly black dog and wondering if he might have bitten off more than he can chew. He considered getting a smaller breed, but felt reassured at the idea of a larger dog serving as a bodyguard for his son. And Great Danes are known to be gentle with children. "Don't worry, Alfred. I'll see to it that he's well-trained. Your rose bushes will be safe, you have my word."

Alfred doesn't seem reassured, but agrees to fetch Damian after his violin lesson and lead him out to the garden, where Bruce is waiting with the excited dog, holding his collar tightly to stop him from lunging after a squirrel chattering in a nearby tree.

Damian’s breath hitches when he sees the dog, so stunned he can’t move or speak. The spell only breaks when the dog bounds forward and sniffs him curiously, nudging his arm. Damian strokes his ears and looks up at Bruce inquiringly. “Father…“

“For you, Damian. The dog you’ve been asking for.” Bruce hands over the leash, his misgivings over this decision growing as he realizes Damian won't have a hope of holding on if the dog bolts. He had forgotten how small his son is. But it's too late to take it back--Damian is touching the dog's dark nose in awe and letting his fingers be licked, clearly already besotted. “He’s your responsibility now, so take good care of him.”

“He will get much bigger?” asks Damian. Bruce confirms, and he looks pleased.

“You should think of a name for him.”

“Yes. I will.” And that’s all Damian says on the subject. He pulls on the leash and his dog follows happily, tongue lolling. “We’re going hunting now.”

“Hunting for what?”

“Fossils," replies Damian simply, with the kind of self-assuredness only a child can possess. The dog yips as if in agreement. "He’s going to dig them up for me. We’re going to find a dinosaur.”

Bruce nods. “All right, then. Good luck.”

He watches them head out into the yard, feeling, for the first time, like he’s succeeded as a father. That he’s made the right choice. It’s not so difficult, being a good dad. All he had to do was buy Damian a dog. He should have done it sooner.

Suddenly, he remembers his promise to Alfred, and he calls after his son, “But no digging in Alfred’s flowerbeds! Stay away from the garden!”

Damian and his dog don’t find any dinosaur skeletons. What they do find and bring back to proudly show to Bruce is, unmistakably, a fragment of a human shin bone, still muddy from the creek bed they dug it out of. Bruce pinches the bridge of his nose and tries to tell himself that, this being Gotham, he shouldn’t be surprised.

That is only the beginning of the trouble Damian causes with his new playmate. Over the next few days Bruce hears many complaints from Alfred, such as how the two of them were chasing a skunk by the edge of the woods, or playing fetch inside and shattering a lamp. Bruce has a hard time being angry, because he would rather Damian get into messes while playing with his dog than spend that time in the cave trying to learn more about crimefighting, or cooped up in the library reading about war strategies, or obsessively training with whatever weapons he can get his hands on. At least he’s acting like a normal little boy.

Even Alfred, the one forced to clean up after these accidents, agrees that Damian’s behaviour, if troublesome, is healthy—he spends more time outside and more time  _playing_ , and he’s formed a strong emotional bond with the dog, which is good to see. But Alfred has his limits, and those are clearly being tested one afternoon when he escorts a mud-splattered Damian into Bruce’s study, after boy and dog have tracked more mud through the house than seems possible.

“This is not mud,” Alfred informs him wearily, nose wrinkled in distaste. “I had the south lawn fertilized this morning.”

“Ah.” Bruce’s nose wrinkles as well, when the smell hits him. “Were the workers still here, when he—“

“I stayed inside until the truck was gone. I  _listened_ ,” insists Damian, crossing his arms, despite the manure caked on his clothes that proves he only  _half_ -listened, at best. “Me and Titus were just playing.”

"You've named him Titus?"

"He chose the name,” says Damian, as though that’s something dogs do all the time. Alfred sighs and explains how the dog had torn up several books in Damian’s room that morning while the two of them were cooped up inside to stay out of sight, including a copy of Titus Andronicus that Damian was partway finished reading. Titus ran through the house with a scrap of the cover bearing his name hanging from his mouth, and Damian called it fate.

“A play he shouldn’t even be reading yet,” adds Alfred, frowning at the boy. “I’m happy to see him showing an interest in Shakespeare’s works, but I specifically told him that one was inappropriate for a child his age.”

“It didn’t seem so bad to me,” Damian argues. “It only had people killing each other.”

Bruce touches him on the shoulder in warning. “That’s enough, Damian. Help Alfred clean up the mess you’ve made. And no dessert for you tonight.”

After Damian has taken a much-needed bath and they’ve finished dinner—which  _does_  end with Damian getting dessert, since none of them can stay angry with him when he looks so forlorn—Bruce helps him change into his pajamas and tucks him into bed. Titus, unconcerned by the lack of space, manages to fit himself beside Damian on the bed, his head resting contentedly on the boy’s stomach.

“I take it you’re liking your dog, Damian?”

“I love him,” Damian says solemnly.

Bruce gives a soft smile. “That’s good to hear.”

“I want a horse next,” Damian says between yawns, as his eyes drift shut. “A big, fast one.”

* * *

 

Bruce spends part of an afternoon drafting up a birth certificate for Damian, since Talia had never found one necessary. There’s so much he doesn’t know about his son, like the time of day he was born, or even the country he was born in. All of that information can be fabricated in the documents, he can make it whatever he wants, but he’s begun thinking perhaps he should call Talia and ask when he realizes there’s something else he doesn’t know, something even more important.

He looks over his desk at the boy reading in front of the fireplace, leaning against a dozing Titus and balancing a book almost as heavy as he is on his lap. “Damian, what’s your middle name?”

Damian frowns, confused. “I don’t have any other name.”

“I see.” Bruce sits back and taps his pen thoughtfully, considering the opportunity presented to him. Talia named their son without his consultation, but he can still have this. “I’d like to give you one.”

“Okay.” Damian stands up and looks at him expectantly, as though waiting for him to hand it over like a wrapped present or a piece of candy.

“I need some time to decide,” he explains.

“Oh.” Damian sits down again. “Do you have a middle name? What is it?”

“Thomas, after my father.” Which is what he would have wanted to name Damian, if he had been given the chance. It’s definitely what he’s leaning towards for Damian’s middle name. “Do you have any preference for yours?”

Damian thinks about it for a moment, and a slow smile spreads across his face. “ _Dragon_.”

Bruce puts down his pen. “I’ll come up with something.”

* * *

 

“Father, look!” Damian calls from up on the trapeze platform, holding the bar while Dick helps adjust his grip. Dick is visiting this afternoon and wanted to take over Tim and Damian’s training to teach them some acrobatic skills, which gives Bruce extra time to get some work done. Or so he’d hoped. “Father! Are you watching?”

Bruce briefly glances up from the Batmobile’s engine. “Yes, Damian. Very good.”

“You’re not watching!” Damian yells angrily. Bruce looks over again. He is watching just in time to see Damian, who is twisting around midair to glare at him, lose his concentration and his grip and land bouncing in the nets. He huffs as he gets to his feet, unhurt except for his pride. Tim snickers and Damian throws him a dark look.

“Try it again. I’ll watch this time,” Bruce says encouragingly. Damian climbs back up the ladder in determination and executes the flip perfectly. Dick calls him a natural, which soothes his wounded pride.

They finish up with the trapeze and move on to practicing with escrima sticks, Dick’s weapon of choice. Damian, humbled by his embarrassing fall, doesn’t yell for Bruce to watch his every move, and Bruce is relieved to finally work on the Batmobile without distraction.

He finishes the repairs as the boys are wrapping up their training. The hood shuts with a satisfying clank and he wipes his hands on a grease-stained rag before heading down the stairs, expecting Damian to run up and assail him with demands to sit down and watch every new move he’s learned.

What he sees instead is Damian hurling an escrima stick with all of his strength at the back of Tim’s head.

Tim, slinging a towel around his neck, turns just in time to spot the flying weapon out of the corner of his eye. He moves instinctually, with reactions drilled into him through months of intense training, and catches it neatly in the air. His brain takes a moment to catch up, and he blinks in surprise at the escrima stick in his hand like he doesn’t remember how it got there.

“Damian!” thunders Bruce, striding over and grabbing the boy’s wrist as he’s gearing up to throw the other stick. “Training is over. You can’t throw things at Tim without warning while his back is turned.”

“Your enemies will give you no warning,” Damian says ominously. Which Bruce can’t help but agree with in principle, but it doesn’t excuse what he did.

“You could have seriously hurt Tim.”

“It’s fine, really,” insists Tim, holding up his hands appeasingly. “I caught it, and I doubt he can throw hard enough to hurt me, anyway. Can we forget about this?”

Bruce can’t. He can’t let this slide. Whatever possessed Damian to throw a weapon at Tim is not acceptable, and it’s long past time for the boy to learn that. What if it had been a  _knife_? Crossing his arms, Bruce frowns sternly down at Damian, who for once has the decency to look ashamed. “I’m putting you in time-out. Go to the locker room. Sit on the bench and think about what you did. I’ll get you when your time-out is over.”

“Yes, Father,” Damian says quietly. Tim looks pitying and slightly distressed, worried that Damian will hold this against him.

Bruce has threatened time-outs before, but this is the first time he’s followed through. Perhaps he should have done it sooner. Perhaps he’s been too lenient. There is a lot of behaviour he can overlook, because Alfred deals with it for him, but he won’t allow Damian to attack Tim.

Watching Damian walk away with his head down sulkily, acting like he’s headed to the gallows, Bruce can’t help feeling guilty, and wonders if he was too strict. He looks over at Dick.

“I think you did right, Bruce. He could use more rules and consequences,” says Dick. which, considering his vocal criticisms of Bruce’s rules and consequences in the past, means a lot. He claps Tim on the back, trying to cheer him up as well. “I’m sure he’ll get over it sooner than you think.”

And Dick is right. Damian is sniffling when Bruce tells him the time-out is over. He gives Damian a hug that isn’t returned—the boy squirms away and stiffly apologizes to Tim, then runs upstairs and spends the rest of the afternoon taking out his anger on the piano, but he’s back to normal before dinner. He shows up in the doorway to the study, holding a picture of the Batmobile he drew for Bruce, and climbs up onto his father’s lap to explain at length the improvements he added, such as the large helicopter blades sticking out of the roof.

The picture is Bruce’s to keep. After Damian has left, he studies it intently, noting the astounding amount of detail and the neat little signature in the corner—all this from a  _five year old_ —and decides he must ask Alfred for a frame to put it in. He likes this part of being a parent. Hopefully Damian has learned his lesson and Bruce won’t have to resort to time-outs again, but he knows that’s a very slim hope.

* * *

 

Tim is glad for the excuse to put down his chemistry textbook when Titus runs into the room, barking urgently.

He tousles the excited dog’s ears fondly. "What is it, boy?" He loves Titus. Damian might be a brat, but his dog is the friendliest Tim has ever met, and since he’s living at the manor, it’s like Titus is  _his_  dog, too. He’s never had a dog before. Secretly, he thinks Titus likes him better than Damian—he doesn’t pull on the dog’s tail or squeeze him in too-tight hugs.

Tim stands, assuming Titus wants to go for a walk and have some sticks thrown for him. Odd—he thinks he remembers Damian going out to play with Titus in the garden less than an hour ago. Maybe Damian had to run back inside for a lesson.

Titus barks louder and whines and tugs at Tim’s sleeve with his teeth. That’s when Tim gets the hint that Titus isn’t being playful—something’s  _wrong._ He follows Titus out of the house, breaking into a run when the dog picks up speed.

He’s led into the gardens, past the topiaries and the greenhouse, into a grove with a fountain in the middle. Damian is slouched against one of the big oak trees, unmoving, leaves and splintered branches scattered around him. Sprinting faster, Tim shouts in panic until the boy lifts his head, scowling and sniffling, wiping at his eyes furiously so Tim won’t see he's been crying.

“ _Tt_. Stupid dog,” Damian admonishes, batting away Titus and his concerned licks. “Why did you bring  _him_?”

Tim falls to his knees next to Damian. “Are you hurt?” he asks breathlessly.

“No,” says Damian, but Tim can plainly see the bloody scrapes on his hands and arms, and the oozing cut on his knee. He fights for every strained, wheezing breath. Hopefully it’s just the wind knocked out of him, but he should be checked over by Alfred just in case.

"What happened?"

Damian wipes a smudge of dirt from his forehead, leaving a smear of blood behind instead. "I..." Titus snuffles curiously at a patch of grass by Damian's side, and Tim leans over to see what's hidden there--a baby bird in the grass, small and brown, shying away from both Damian's cupped hand and Titus's nose, and flapping its wings ineffectually.

“Did you take it out of its nest?” Tim asks, dismayed. “Damian—“

“No! I found it on the ground. It was all alone. Abandoned. I tried to put it back in the tree, but I… I fell,” he admits sulkily, glaring up at the tree like it’s the one at fault.

Tim shoos Titus away and examines the poor, terrified bird. Some kind of sparrow. It hops about in agitation, trying to get away from them. “Looks like it has most of its feathers," he tells Damian. “That means it probably left the nest on its own, even though it can’t fly so good yet. Its parents will be looking out for it.” On cue, a burst of angry chirping rains down on them from the tree above their heads. “There. Hear that? We should leave it alone. C’mon.”

Tim hoists Damian up by the arms, but the younger boy scowls and twists out of his grip, preferring to fall onto his butt on the grass than accept his help. Titus noses at Damian's shoulder like he's trying to nudge him upright.

“I don’t need to be carried!" says Damian, even as he struggles to his feet, clinging to the tree for support. Even as he has to hop on one leg because of his hurt knee, and his shaky, gulping breaths nearly cause him to lose his balance and fall back to the ground again. "I’m fine.”

"You're not fine, Damian," Tim says sternly, remembering the advice Dick gave him about dealing with Damian. To not let Damian push him around (he respects that) but not be too mean about it (he's still just a kid). "You fell out of a tree, you’re lucky you didn’t break a bone. It's okay to--"

"I don't need your help."

Tim sighs. "Piggy back?" he asks, a last resort, and it works. Damian clambers up onto his back like a monkey, leaving bloody smudges on his shirt. He doubts something as simple as a piggy back ride will turn him into Damian’s best friend, like Dick claimed, but he’ll take whatever he can get.

"Will it be okay?" asks Damian, glancing back at the bird worriedly. Each of his breaths shudders against Tim's back, but they seem to be easing slowly. He's going to be fine.

“It didn't look hurt, so I think so. We can check back on it later to be sure.”

Damian is quiet for a while. “Sometimes the parents won't take it back after people touch it."

"For some animals, yeah. I'm pretty sure it's not a big deal for birds."

"How do you know?"

"Dick got me into watching the nature channels as a way to unwind after patrol, when I'm having trouble sleeping. I've learned a lot." Tim pauses to shift Damian up higher against his back when his grip starts slipping. "You would like the nature shows. We should watch together sometime."

“You’ll go with me, later, to see the bird?” asks Damian, tightening his arms around Tim's neck. “I want to make sure its parents haven't left it alone.”

“Of course I will."

It takes some careful maneuvering on Tim's part to open the doors and get them inside, and Titus certainly doesn't help, getting tangled around Tim's legs and nearly tripping him. Any friendship Tim has forged with Damian today will be shattered irreparably if he drops him.

They find Alfred in the laundry room. He tuts disapprovingly and forbids future tree-climbing as he sits Damian atop the washing machine, then goes to get a first-aid kit (and some cookies, because Damian wisely played up his crying and sniffling to get an extra treat). Damian allows Tim to stick the Batman band-aid on his knee, which feels like a small victory. He shares one of his cookies, too, which feels like an even bigger victory.

* * *

 

One afternoon, Damian finds the door to the forbidden bedroom open, and his father standing inside. He doesn’t move or touch anything, he just stands silently with a tired frown on his face and looks at the room around him, at the open textbook waiting on the desk and the jacket slung over the back of the chair, all the ownerless belongings left exactly as they were.

“Hello, Damian,” he says without glancing over. He’s impossible to sneak up on. Damian’s tried. “Did you need something?”

“No. I was just looking for you.”

Bruce raises an eyebrow, a ghost of a smile passing across his face. “You were looking for me, but you don’t need anything.”

“Correct.” The contradiction is lost on Damian. Often he likes to seek out his father for no particular reason, just to see him and know where he is. He thinks it must be a normal thing, because he has noticed how Alfred is always checking up on him the same way.

Damian climbs up to sit on the edge of the bed, disturbing the carefully tucked and smoothed blanket. Looking pained, Bruce turns away and watches the bookshelf. He reaches out, fingertips passing over a row of worn schoolbooks and stopping to hover over a snowglobe of Gotham City, like he wants to touch it. He doesn’t. They’re both intruders here.

The first time Damian saw this room, he didn’t know whose it was. Now he does. The dead Robin’s. Tim told him. He didn’t say much else though, no matter how much Damian pressed him for more.

“How did he die?” asks Damian. All he knows is that he died as Robin.

“He was killed,” Bruce says without turning around. “It was my fault, for not saving him in time.”

“Who killed him?”

“No one you need to worry about.”

“Oh. So then you killed them? For what they did?”

Bruce whirls around sharply, the appalled expression on his face telling Damian that he has misunderstood badly. “I’ve told you before, Damian, killing is the worst thing you can do. I have never taken a life. I won’t.”

“I know. I remember. But…” Damian pouts and tilts his head to the side in confusion. "Mama killed people who tried to hurt me, because she loves me. Doesn’t that make it okay? Shouldn’t you get justice?” He raises round, imploring eyes to his father. “If bad people were going to hurt me, wouldn’t you love me enough to kill them?”

Bruce tenses as though struck. Damian can see that thinking about the scenario is hurting him. It hurts Damian, too, the idea that his father doesn’t love him very much after all.

"I can’t kill. I couldn’t remain Batman if I did,” Bruce says quietly. “I just can't. I'd sooner sacrifice myself to protect you than take a life, if it came to that.”

“And if someone  _did_  hurt me when you’re not around, you wouldn't kill them to get justice?”

“Why are you asking me these questions? You’re too young to be—“ He stares at Damian, and for a moment it doesn’t seem like he’s seeing Damian as a child. It doesn’t seem like he’s seeing Damian as Damian at all. He’s frozen and pale like he’s looking at a ghost. Then that moment breaks. He shakes his head as though clearing it and sits down next to Damian on the bed. “That’s not justice, Damian. That's revenge. Vengeance. That’s bad. I can’t explain it more clearly than that.”

Damian gives him a long, measured look. “It doesn't matter anyway,” he says finally, though it matters very much to him. “I won't let anyone hurt me. And once I'm grown-up and you're old I'll be able to protect you and Mama instead of the other way around. I'll get justice on anyone who tries to hurt you and make them pay."

"I'm not sure you understand what I've been saying.”

“I understand,” Damian assures him. They’re both silent for a while, sitting in the dead boy’s room, until Damian can no longer hold back the question that threatens to claw him apart from the inside, and blurts out, “Do you not love me as much as Mama does, if you wouldn’t ever—“

Bruce silences him with a crushing hug, his hand on the back of Damian’s head protectively. “No. That’s not true. Never think that.”

* * *

 

Damian should be happy. Dick is visiting today, and they’ve spent most of the afternoon training Titus to do new tricks. Now he’s sitting in the kitchen for his snack, a glass of milk and his favourite kind of cookies, and he knows he should be happy. But he can only frown at his plate, feeling no appetite, his mind preoccupied.

“Am I bad?” he asks Dick, when he can’t hold it back any longer.

“What?”

“Am I bad? Is there bad in me?” Damian watches Dick intently, searching for the answer on his face. But Dick just looks stunned. “If Father thinks my mama and grandfather are bad, does he think I’m bad, too?”

"Bruce doesn't think your mother is—"

“He has them on his enemy list on the computer. I saw it. There were files that said they’re criminals.”

“When did you see that?” asks Alfred reproachfully, turning away from the sink and putting down his dishrag. “Master Damian, did you sneak into the cave again? You’ve been told, many times, that you’re not allowed in there alone.”

Damian shrugs unapologetically. “I wanted to ask the Oracle a question about the future.” She keeps saying she's not a real oracle, but he still thinks it's worth asking.

“You’re not  _bad_ ,” Dick tells him gently. “You misbehave sometimes, sure, but that’s just because you’re a kid. You’re still learning.”

“If I do too many bad things and keep getting into trouble, is Father going to put me on the enemy list?” Damian asks. He used to think nothing could be worse than time-out… until now.

Dick and Alfred share a worried glance. “Your father would never do that,” says Alfred, while Dick squeezes Damian’s shoulder comfortingly. “He loves you very much.”

“I thought he loved Mama, but he put her on the list,” says Damian. He can feel tears swelling at the corners of his eyes but he sets his jaw tight and sniffs and refuses to cry. “When I go back to live with Mama, will that make me an enemy like her?”

The stool falls over with a clatter as Dick stands abruptly, his hands clenched into fists at his sides. The expression on his face is very similar to one Damian has seen from his mama, whenever she's about to tear into someone who threatened him. “Where is he?" Dick asks Alfred, his voice strained. "The cave?”

“I believe he has a meeting with Mr Fox in an hour. He may have left already.”

Dick storms out of the kitchen to check. He looks ready to chase Bruce into the city if he has to.

 _Tsk_ -ing, Alfred sets the stool upright and, shockingly, sits down on it, facing Damian. Damian has never seen him sit down in the kitchen before. "What is this all about, Master Damian? You know your father would never turn his back on you in such a way."

"What if I killed someone? Would he think I'm bad then?” Damian blurts out. "He says that killing is the worst thing ever, but Mama told me if someone attacks me, I should kill them first."

"I hardly think you need to worry about—"

"No. I do."

Alfred looks so sad—even his moustache is drooping—that Damian wishes he never brought this up. ”Forgive me. You're so young, I forget…" He clears his throat. "What I mean, rather, is that your father's rules are, first and foremost, for  _himself_ , and for those who've joined him in his mission, like Master Tim. One day, when you're older and perhaps decide to fight alongside him, he will have different expectations, but for now anything you do in self-defense is not your fault."

"But, won't he..."

"You may not know this, Master Damian, but I have killed other men before, in war. It was terrible, but I had to, in order to keep myself alive and complete my mission. So, you see, your father doesn't hold it against me, nor would he with you."

Damian stares speechlessly at Alfred for a long time, his eyes wide. He can’t imagine Alfred as a soldier, he can’t imagine Alfred as anything but a very old man who fixes him snacks and takes him to the park and helps wash the paint off his hands and face when he’s gotten overzealous with an art project. His respect for the man, already high, rises even further.

"However, if someone  _were_  to attack you,” Alfred continues. “I hope you would run away and find one of us to protect you rather than face them on your own."

Damian wrinkles his nose. "Run away? Like a coward?"

Alfred pats Damian’s head and places another cookie on his plate. "Seeking protection from those who care about you is not cowardice, Master Damian. Cowardice is an adult attacking a child. Please remember that. We all know that you are very brave, you do not need to prove that to any of us."

* * *

 

Damian fights to keep the unease from showing on his face, but he can’t help tightening his grip on his father’s hand. He doesn’t like this place, where the air smells sour and tired-looking people rush through the hallways, and a sense of weakness hangs over everything.

“This is the hospital,” Bruce says, when Damian asks. Damian looks around them, warily curious. He knows the word, of course, but he’s never been inside one. “Your grandfather worked in a hospital. My father. He was a doctor. I told you, remember?"

Damian remembers everything his father tells him. "Yes. You said he saved people. Did he work here?"

"No, a different hospital. It's named after him now. I'll take you there... one day.” His voice falters at the end, the promise a weak one. He barely takes Damian anywhere, and when he does he wears a disguise. Right now he has a baseball cap and a fake nose. Damian doesn’t find the disguises so exciting anymore, and he wants  _just once_  for his father, instead of Alfred, to go to the park with him so he can show off how high he can go on the swings.

An angry remark wants to slip off his tongue but he bites it back, remembering how Alfred told him over and over that he must be on his best behaviour today, that Tim inviting him along on his visit to his sick father means a great deal, and Damian must repay that trust by not making any fusses. Damian still isn’t sure about the old man’s words, but… It’s an odd thing—he finds that, just like he can’t bear to disappoint his parents, he can’t let Alfred down, either. So he’s determined to be good and polite and  _quiet_. Most of what everyone deems his misbehaviour seems to come from him saying things that dismay them.

Tim looks nervous and sad and a bit sick himself. He carries a small arrangement of flowers that he picked from the garden with Alfred’s permission, including some of the roses Damian’s mother loves so much, which Damian doesn’t think is right. If it was up to him—and it should be—Tim wouldn’t even be allowed to touch those roses.

They enter the room and Damian’s first thought is that the man in the bed must be on the verge of death. He looks like he’s rotting away, sagging skin on frail bones, tubes connecting him to beeping machines. Tim sets the flowers down on the bedside table and sits, taking his father’s limp hand. He starts chatting away about school and his days at the manor. The man doesn’t respond. He doesn’t do more than blink.

A surge of revulsion crawls up Damian’s throat and he recoils at the scene, wanting to gag. He’s seen dead bodies before, and that man in the bed is just another one of them. This is  _wrong_. Why can’t everyone else see that?

He tugs on his father’s hand in distress until he’s taken out of the room and its warm, cloying air. Bruce sits Damian down in a chair in the hallway and waits patiently as his breathing slows down.

“Better now?” Bruce asks, kneeling on the scuffed linoleum with his hands resting comfortingly on Damian’s shoulders. “I didn’t mean for you to get scared—“

“I wasn’t!” Damian insists angrily.

“It’s all right if you were.”

Inside, Tim is still talking. Damian hears his own name mentioned. The rest he can’t decipher, but whatever Tim is saying about him, he doesn’t sound irritated or annoyed, which surprises him.

Bruce is still looking at Damian in concern. “I know it looked bad, but Mr Drake isn’t dying,” he says reassuringly. “He’s already recovered a lot since his accident. There was a point the doctors thought he would never open his eyes. Now they believe he’ll be able to speak and walk, in time.”

Unconvinced, Damian wants to say that the man should be put out of his misery, like his grandfather’s horse when it was injured badly by a rockslide. But he doesn’t because he knows it would only make his father upset, and he promised Alfred he would be  _good_ , which means not saying upsetting things. Then he gets another idea.

“Why don’t we put him in the Lazarus pit? That’s what we do with Grandfather whenever he gets old and sick, or very hurt. We can fix him and then none of us have to come back here ever again.”

He waits for his father to return his smile, to agree and thank him for the ingenious plan. That doesn’t happen. Bruce’s face remains grim. “We both know Ra’s doesn’t allow anyone else to access the pits.”

“I can ask Grandfather. He’ll say yes. Or I’ll make him.” How exactly, Damian isn’t sure. He swings and kicks his dangling feet in frustration, wracking his brain. “It doesn’t matter what he says—the Lazarus pits will belong to me when I’m older. I can do whatever I want with them. I can put anyone I want in them.”

“We can’t. Even if we could, we can’t risk the aftereffects. The Lazarus pits are dangerous, and bring out the worst in people. Look what they’ve done to Ra’s, not that he was ever—” Bruce stops himself abruptly. Damian tilts his head inquisitively, waiting—not that his grandfather was ever  _what_?—but Bruce changes the subject. “I know you want to help, but the Lazarus pits are not the answer. Tim’s father is getting better on his own, it’s just going to take some time. The best way you can help is by being nice to Tim. What he’s going through is difficult and he needs as much support as we can give him.”

Damian remembers all the times his mother told him to be brave, and he remembers his promise to Alfred, and he takes his father’s hand. They return to the room and Damian stands there without cringing while Tim introduces him to Mr Drake, who stares blankly and doesn’t seem to notice. Damian clings tightly to Bruce’s hand all the way home, thankful beyond measure that his own father is strong and well, not lying half-dead in a hospital bed.

From then on he doesn’t begrudge Tim  _as much_  for taking up some of Bruce’s attention. He can share his father a little bit until Tim’s is better.

* * *

 

"What time will you come home?" asks Damian, as Bruce pulls the blanket up snugly under his chin. Damian sleeps so oddly, flat on his back and as stiff and unmoving as a board, never so much as wrinkling his covers in the night. Bruce wonders if it's a habit to be concerned about. It doesn't seem natural.

"I'm not sure. Late. Long after you fall asleep." The dog is curled up in his bed by the window, dozing with one ear perked to listen for any strange sounds. Bruce is glad to have Titus here and watching over Damian when he can't be.

"I want to wake up and see you when you get back. I want to go with you. I want to— "

"I've told you, Damian. You're too young. If you want to grow up strong, you need to get a good night's sleep."

"Tell me a story," orders Damian like he does every night, an imperious figure with his stuffed animals stacked around him like a throne. "Tell me about how you got the big dinosaur in the cave."

Bruce prefers the nights when Damian is content with a chapter or two from one of the books on the shelf. More often than not, he wants a story of Bruce's adventures as Batman, sometimes one he's heard a dozen times, sometimes one that's brand-new. Bruce is running out of child-friendly stories... he's had to modify others, omit some of the violence and add happier endings. Damian's seen enough horrors, he doesn't need to hear about more.

He doesn't mind telling the story about the dinosaur--one of Damian's favourites--and he's told it so many times that it's become polished with use and the words flow easily. Another story is demanded afterwards, and Bruce recalls one of his encounters with the Riddler. Damian likes being given the chance to solve the riddles on his own.

The riddle tonight gives him difficulty. He repeats it to himself quietly over and over, trying to summon the answer, his dark eyebrows knitted together. "You can sleep on it and tell me the answer tomorrow," says Bruce. He doesn't want to keep him awake any longer.

"Yes," agrees Damian. Just when Bruce thinks his eyes are finally going to close, they snap back open. "Are you going to fight the Riddler tonight?"

"I don't think so. No.”

"Good. You need me to solve the riddles for you, when you do."

Tugging at the blankets once more to make sure Damian is still tucked in tight, Bruce stands. His duties to the city can't be kept waiting any longer. "Sleep well, Damian."

"One day I'm going to help you fight the bad guys. Once I'm grown up enough."

Bruce turns off the light and leaves, feeling Damian's determined gaze on his back as he quietly closes the door.

Later, as he's stumbling through a filthy alleyway to the safety of the Batmobile, blood dripping between his fingers as he keeps pressure on the wound on his side, his vision hazing at the edges, he thinks,  _Never_. Never will he let Damian put on a mask.

* * *

 

Damian wakes up knowing the answer to the riddle, as clear as the daylight streaming through his window. He can't wait to tell his father.

But he has no choice but to wait, because his father is still sleeping. He always sleeps late after spending the night as Batman, and after the several times Damian burst into the dark bedroom, tugged away the blankets, and jumped onto the bed in his demand for attention, he has been forbidden from waking Bruce up in the morning. He considers doing it anyway, out of impatience, but he doesn't want his father to be grumpy with him.

When morning turns into afternoon and then  _late_  afternoon, with still no sign of his father shuffling into the kitchen in search of food and coffee, Damian realizes angrily that he's not just sleeping in, he probably never came home and slept at all. He's away in the city, or busy working down in the cave (which Damian hasn't been able to get inside without permission since they added more security to the clock entrance, but he's been working on it). Damian tries asking Alfred where his father is and when he'll be back, but instead of clear answers the butler gives him chores to keep him busy.

Eventually, Damian gets the opportunity to sneak away from helping dust the portraits when Alfred steps out to tend to the laundry. He drops his duster and heads to the library, only to find Tim in  _his_  favourite spot, in the window seat looking out at the front lawns. He sits slouched, his arms wrapped around his knees and his clothes and hair rumpled like he just rolled out of bed.

"What are you looking at?" asks Damian. There's no answer, so he asks louder. Tim jerks like he's about to fall over and whirls around, eyes blinking away sleep rapidly above dark bags. He must not have gotten any sleep last night. He looks like he’ll doze off again at any moment.

"I'm waiting for Dick,” says Tim, looking back towards the front gates. “He'll be pulling up any minute now."

"I didn't know he's visiting today." Damian smiles, pleased. Just for a moment, and then he remembers that he's angry. "Where is my father?"

"He's... He's in bed." Tim scrubs a hand through his messy hair and takes a deep breath. "Damian, I should tell you... Last night, there was—“

But Damian has already turned and started walking away, not particularly feeling like standing there and listening to Tim. His father's bedroom door is locked, like usual, and as Damian is considering how to get inside it swings open to reveal Alfred, carrying a small basin of medical tools and bloodstained bandages.

“Oh dear,” says Alfred as Damian stares mutely at the blood, slowly understanding. "There’s no need to worry, Master Damian. Your father will be just fine. However, he needs his rest at the moment. Why don’t you come with me to the kitchen—“

Bruce's hoarse voice comes from inside the room. “It’s all right, Alfred. Let him in.”

"Sir, I must insist—"

Damian slips through the door before Alfred can protest further, pushing it shut behind him. The bedroom is cool and dim, lit only by a gap of sun shining between the thick curtains. Damian walks up to the side of the tall bed and stands on his tiptoes, trying to see his father.

He sees bandages wrapped around his father’s torso, peeking out above the blanket. Climbing onto the bed, Damian sees more bandages around his arm and shoulder. Bruises everywhere else.

"You're hurt,” says Damian, his lip wobbling. He’s never seen his father hurt before. He’s only seen his mama hurt a few times, and never as bad as this. People get hurt and killed all the time, he knows that, but  _other_  people, not his  _parents._

”Don't touch.” Bruce grabs Damian’s hand before he can poke at the bandages, and even that small movement makes his breath hitch in pain. Damian wants to hug his father, but he can’t find a spot he can hug without hurting him. “Come over here,” says Bruce, patting the other side of the mattress.

Damian clambers over Bruce’s legs and sees that, yes, this side is better. Less bandages. He nestles in with his head on Bruce’s shoulder, a strong arm wrapped around him. He can feel and hear his father breathing, proof that he’s alive—slow, even breaths, except for the one in a few that will rattle in his chest.

“What happened?” demands Damian, already planning how to avenge his father.

Bruce sighs. His eyes look foggy and unfocused. “Gotham,” is all he says, and even that is said with great difficulty because he’s overtaken by a fit of laboured breathing. Damian clutches tightly to his arm, waiting for him to quiet down.  

He doesn’t like the way the room smells, like sharp chemicals. He doesn’t like the machines set up and the tube snaking down into his father’s arm. It reminds him too much of the hospital they visited. It makes him think of frightening things he’s never considered before…

"If you get hurt like Tim's dad, or if you die, who will be my father?"

“You shouldn’t worry about that happening."

"But what if? Tim has you. Who will I have?"

Bruce pats his hair clumsily. ”You'll have Alfred. He'll take care of you, just like he took care of me when I was a child. You'll have Dick. And you'll always have your mother. You have plenty of family, Damian."

"But I want  _you_. I love you, Papa,” says Damian, hugging Bruce around the neck. He doesn’t see the soft, unguarded amazement on Bruce’s face. "I don't want just them, and I don't want a different father. So I’m deciding I won't let you ever die. If you get hurt again I'll have you put in the Lazarus pit to fix you."

"No, Damian. I  _don’t_ …” Bruce begins, aghast, and then stops and closes his eyes against a wave of pain. His voice, when he speaks again, is tired, too tired to argue. "I'll try not to get hurt badly enough that it comes to that.”

Damian smiles. “If you do, I’ll save you,” he vows. “I solved the riddle. Do you want to hear the answer?"

"Yes. Tell me."

Damian says it in Bruce’s ear, and kisses his father’s cheek after Bruce tells him how proud he is. "Your face is scratchy," Damian says disapprovingly, touching the stubble. Bruce pulls him closer and rubs his cheek against Damian’s, making the boy squirm in annoyance and then eventually, grudgingly, laugh.

* * *

 

“Are you going to take over as Batman until my father is better?” Damian asks Dick, making him choke on his sip of water.

The two of them are sitting on the bench beside the training area, the cave quiet around them. Dick is staying at the manor while Bruce is recovering and has taken over Damian’s training. They just finished a lesson on the trapeze, during which Damian didn’t fall once. Dick praised him, calling him even better than himself at that age, and Damian is still glowing with pride. Even better, Tim is at school today, which means Damian gets Dick’s attention all to himself. It would be a perfect afternoon, if only Damian’s father wasn’t injured and bedridden upstairs.

“No. No, not this time,” Dick answers once he’s done coughing, sounding thankful. He shakes his sweat-damp hair out of his eyes. “I’m just going to help Tim wrap up a few open cases, and I can do that just fine as Nightwing. It shouldn’t take more than a couple nights, then I need to get back to the Titans. No matter what Bruce might think, Gotham can survive without Batman for a week or two, until he’s back on his feet.”

“Would you want to be Batman if I was your Robin?” Damian asks, probing carefully.

Dick frowns at him. “Where’s this coming from?”

“I was just thinking.” Damian looks down at his hands and he wipes a leftover smudge of chalk dust from his palm. “Would you want me as your Robin?”

“I’m not going to be Batman. I certainly don’t want to be. And you’re not going to be Robin for a very long time, if ever.” He fondly wipes away more chalk dust from Damian’s chin, and continues, “But, hypothetically, yes, I think we would make good partners. I’d like having you as my Robin… if you were older.”

Damian nods, only a slight smile betraying that, on the inside, he’s jumping for joy.

Earlier, Dick promised to grant Damian a favour if he did one nice thing for Tim, so that morning during breakfast he poured half of his oatmeal into Tim’s lunch bag, in case Tim gets hungry and needs an extra snack while at school. It will be a pleasant surprise for him, surely. Good deed completed, he’s owed a favour, and he tells Dick that he wants to be taught how to drive the Batmobile.

After some haggling they work out a deal that Damian will be allowed to  _sit_  being the wheel of the Batmobile, but not drive it. Damian is only agreeable to the arrangement because he’s allowed to press as many buttons as he wants—they don’t do anything while the car is turned off and deactivated, but it’s still satisfying. Another reason why Dick is cooler than his father.

Dick sits in the passenger side, his feet up on the dashboard—he made Damian swear not to tell Bruce— and tells stories about his adventures with his team, the Titans. He’s only trying to entertain Damian, and usually Damian loves stories, but hearing all the names of friends that Dick speaks of so fondly, the friends that he spends all of his time with when he’s not here, makes Damian feel a deep, brewing jealousy.

Except for Titus, Dick is Damian’s best friend. His best and only human friend, since he doesn’t feel ready to award Tim that title. But Dick has other friends that he’s known longer and he’s closer to. Damian doesn’t think that’s fair. Dick should be  _his_ , just like…

Damian smiles. Of course. He knows exactly what Dick is to him. Not merely any common friend, but the person he’s been waiting for and dreaming of all those times he read about Alexander and realized, in his loneliness, what he was missing. Part of his soul dwelling in another body, as Aristotle described. Surely once he makes Dick see this, he won’t be able to value any other friend more.

Damian looks up at Dick’s friendly face and swallows, his throat suddenly dry. “Do you… Will you be my Hephaestion?”

“Your what?” asks Dick, confused.

“Mama tells me I’m going to be the next Alexander, and tame the world,” Damian explains as patiently as he can. “I’ve decided I want you to be my Hephaestion.”

Dick still looks just as confused. “What’s that?”

“My sworn comrade and closest companion. That’s what Alexander and Hephaestion were. Like Achilles and Patroclus.”

Recognition flickers in Dick’s eyes at the last two names. “From the Iliad?” he recalls, then frowns. “Didn’t one of them die? And then—”

“They both died,” says Damian unconcernedly. “All the people in those stories die, because they lived a long time ago. We should take a blood oath to always be loyal and true to each other. Do you have a knife?”

Dick shakes his head, his mouth a stern line. “No. We’re not doing any blood oaths. Alfred would kill me.” Damian, wounded by this refusal, pouts and jabs at buttons on the console like it will make him feel better, until Dick ventures, “Why don’t we do a pinky promise instead?”

“I’ve never done one of those before.”

“I’ll show you.” He takes Damian’s hand. The boy watches warily. “We wrap our pinky fingers together like this, and then we make a promise.”

“Is it a very powerful promise?”

“Absolutely.”

“Okay.” Damian tightens his pinky finger around Dick’s and takes a deep breath. “I, Damian, vow to always be loyal and truthful to you. To fight by your side and defend your life like it’s my own.” He goes on, adding grand statements about trust and devotion that he takes from books he’s read, trying to make it the best vow in history. Once he’s started to accidentally repeat himself, he finishes with a decisive, “Until the end of time.”

Dick repeats it almost perfectly, and Damian is pleased that the words sound even more impressive coming from him. Damian has finally found his Hephaestion. He can’t wait to tell his mother—he’s sure she’ll be thrilled.

* * *

 

The Martha Wayne Foundation spring fundraiser is the first event Bruce has held at the manor since Damian came into his life, and he regrets that there wasn’t enough time to change the venue.

Guests at Bruce’s parties have a tendency to sneak away and wander through the house, though with the security systems covering every square inch they never get past the first locked door before they’re caught, and no matter what excuses they give about being lost and searching for the bathroom, they’re politely escorted from the property and never receive another invitation. Still, Bruce worries. He slips away from the party as often as he can to check on Damian, excusing himself to pretend to go to the bathroom and even going as far as spilling wine on his shirt so he can leave to change into a fresh one. He worries the noise of the party will keep Damian awake, but every time he peeks into the boy’s room he’s fast asleep. Or, he seems to be.

“I’ve never been to a big party before,” Damian said earlier, when Bruce caught him too close to where the caterers were setting up the dessert tables. “Will there be dancing, and toasts?”

“No. Just a few speeches,” Bruce replied tersely, leading him by the arm away from the ballroom and into the private wings of the house. “It’s best if you stay in your room until it’s over. You would find it extremely boring, I know I do, and there won’t be anyone near your age. Not even Tim’s attending.”

“So?” Damian stuck his nose in the air haughtily. “I would rather send time with adults than  _children_.”

“Not these adults. They spend the whole time posturing and gossiping. Believe me, I would much rather spend my time upstairs with you, but I have a responsibility to be a good host.” At least for a few hours, then he can make a drunken fool of himself and disappear. His injuries haven’t healed enough to make patrolling feasible, but there’s always plenty of work in the cave that needs his attention. “Stay in bed,” he told Damian, as firmly as possible without making it an order. “Get a good night’s sleep. Tomorrow we’ll go fishing in the pond.”

Damian had  _looked_  at him with those clear blue eyes, so like his own, and so capable of seeing right through him. Bruce wanted to assure Damian that he’s not ashamed of him, that it’s not about that, but it wouldn’t make a difference. It won’t change the way Damian must feel, knowing his father is keeping him hidden away on purpose.

The night seems to move along at a crawl. Bruce is wearing a smile that feels as stiff as a mask, listening to one of the foundation’s top donors tell a story about golfing and thinking up his next excuse to sneak away upstairs, when he feels a touch on his elbow. He turns and sees Vicki, sipping from a glass that looks like champagne but, like his, is probably ginger ale. Even while standing here with Bruce, she's keeping an eye out for the next tipsy businessman to probe about illicit activities. Vicki never stops working—something they have in common.

“I was so sorry to hear about your accident, Bruce,” she tells him, her gaze lingering on the bruises on his face and the way he keeps his weight shifted to his left. The worst injuries are hidden under his suit, and are far more serious than the public knows. Her face pinches in disapproval. “At least, until I heard a motorcycle was involved. I don't know why you still own so many of the things. This has been, what? Your fifth crash? Sixth? When will you learn?”

He chuckles good-naturedly and gives a shrug. “Never, unfortunately. I seem to be hopelessly attracted to everything that’s bad for me. Fast cars, extreme sports, dangerous women… I can’t resist any of them.”

“Well, it’s your own fault you’re hurt. You’ll get no pity from me.”

“When have I ever?” He drains his glass and offers to go grab both of them another drink, thinking he can use it as his chance to disappear upstairs for a minute. A shrill, young voice cuts through the hubbub and freezes him in place.

“Where is my father? Where is—“

A boy in plaid pajamas and fluffy slippers weaves deftly through the crowd, followed closely by a clumsy dog that bumps into legs and nearly knocks down several guests while trying to keep up. The boy stops right in front of Bruce.

“Look, Papa!” Damian says urgently, holding up a handful of black fuzz and wings. His face is flushed. “Look! It flew in my window and it hit the wall. I think it’s hurt. Do something!”

Everyone is slack-mouthed and silent, staring at the young boy who called Bruce Wayne his father. The only sound is a champagne glass slipping from a hand and smashing on the floor. Even Vicki is speechless, for the first time since Bruce has known her.

The stunned bat in Damian’s hands regains its senses and launches itself into the air, flapping and screeching in distress. Its cries are joined by those of the people below. They scream and duck as it dips too low, too close to their heads. Gotham’s elite cowers from the small, harmless animal, stumbling against each other in their desperation to get away.

Bruce takes the opportunity to scoop Damian up, grimacing against the stab of pain it causes, and carries him through the distracted crowd. He whistles for Titus to follow. “Let’s get you back to bed, Damian. Alfred will make sure the bat is released safely outside.”

“Can I have one of those little cakes?” Damian is greedily eyeing the desserts in the hands of partygoers.

“You may,” says Bruce, because it’s easier than arguing with him. He grabs one off the buffet table on his way to the stairs.

At the landing, he pauses and glances down. Every pair of eyes below watches him, countless judgmental gazes cast upon him, and worse, on Damian. Murmurs are rippling through the crowd, spreading and growing in volume until everyone in every corner of the room knows that the boy is Bruce Wayne’s son. It takes several corridors of distance until Bruce finally leaves the voices behind, and once he’s in the quiet he feels calm. Calmer than he thought he would. Tomorrow is going to be a mayhem of press and lawyers, but it’s a relief to have it out in the open.

He kisses the top of Damian’s head. He’s proud of his son, and glad that he can finally show it. He doesn’t have to keep him a secret any longer.

Bruce wipes the icing from Damian’s face, tucks him back into bed, and closes the bedroom window. He promises several times that the bat is just fine, and sits on the edge of Damian’s bed until he falls asleep.

Vicki is waiting in the hallway.

“He’s adorable.” She’s peering around Bruce to where Damian is sleeping. Instinctively, Bruce moves to block him out of sight until he closes the door. Vicki launches right into interrogation mode. “What’s his name? How old is he?”

“Damian, and he’s five.”

“And he’s  _yours_ , this time?” she asks. Bruce nods. “I thought so. This is quite something you’ve been keeping hidden,  _Brucie_.” She sounds a bit offended. Though for professional or personal motives, he can’t tell.

“I only learned about him three weeks ago,” says Bruce, as if that’s an excuse. He can see the scandal of it gleaming in her eager eyes. "I wanted to keep him out of the public eye as long as possible, until he was a bit older. He’s just so  _young_. And the press are going to be relentless.”

“Yes, we will be,” Vicki says bluntly. And then, just as bluntly, “I want this story, Bruce. It’s out in the open now. If I don't break it soon, someone else will, and they won't be asking first. Let me have this. We’re friends, you know I have your best interests at heart.”

Bruce arches an eyebrow. He doubts that, sometimes. Vicki doesn’t seem to notice, too dazzled by the story in front of her.

“I’ll spin it in the nicest way. Gotham’s most eligible bachelor, father to a  _kindergartener_? People will eat it up. But you’ll have to give me the exclusive. And I mean  _exclusive_. The more truth we give the public, the fewer horrible rumours they’ll come up with on their own.”

He doesn't trust Vicki completely, but he trusts her more than any other reporter in this city. So he agrees, though he might regret it later, and takes her to his bedroom, though he might regret that as well, so they can sit and speak privately.

She asks him about when and how he met Damian, and why it didn’t happen sooner, jotting down notes in the small notepad she somehow pulled out of her smaller evening bag, and Bruce answers with the careful, believable lies he’s been perfecting for weeks. All of that preparation isn’t enough to shield himself from her final question, the only one she seems truly interested in. It still hurts like a fresh bruise.

“Of course, I’ll need to deliver the answer to what everyone will be dying to know… Who is she? The mother?”

“She’s not in the picture right now.” That’s all he can trust himself to say on the matter.

Vicki examines him through narrowed eyes, chewing on the end on her pen thoughtfully. “You don’t have to tell me,” she says eventually. “But I can’t promise I won’t dig up the answer on my own.”

“You can dig all you like, but you won’t find it,” promises Bruce.

* * *

 

A shiny car pulls up the driveway and a woman steps out of it. Damian’s first thought, watching from the library window, is that his mama is here.

But he’s wrong. It’s obviously not her, on further inspection. The woman, dressed all in black—black dress, dark sunglasses, large black hat—is too short, her skin too pale, her bearing all wrong. And his mother isn’t due for another few days yet. Still, he finds himself disappointed and swallowing against a lump in his throat. For a split second, he had hoped it was her.

Damian watches his father go outside and greet the woman. She kisses his cheek. He wraps his arm around her waist as they walk to the doors.

Damian hates her with all his might.

Alfred enters the library a short while later to tell Damian he’s expected in the parlour once he’s finished the readings assigned by his history tutor. Damian scoffs, hiding it behind the open book he holds in front of his face. He knows his father wants him to meet the woman, a prospect that makes his blood boil. It’s odd—just days ago he wasn’t allowed to meet  _anyone_. Apparently that’s not an issue any longer. His father has even spoken of taking him into the city to see the company that will belong to him one day. Not exactly in those words, but Damian knows what he meant.

Finishing the readings would take Damian another fifteen minutes, but he stalls as much as he can, rereading and flipping pages aimlessly, anything to stay away from the parlour as long as possible. He doesn’t want to meet the horrible, hated woman, and he hates his father right now, too, as much as he can hate one of the people he loves most in the entire world. The only woman his father should be consorting with is his mother.

Eventually they must get tired of waiting, because they come to the library instead. When Damian hears the door creak open, he quickly grabs the nearest book and pretends to be engrossed.

“How are your studies going, Damian?” asks Bruce.

“Fine. I’m almost finished,” Damian lies smoothly, turning a page and studying the diagram upon it. Bruce’s eyebrow is quirked in a way that makes it clear he’s not fooled, but he plays along.

“Good. I’m sorry to interrupt, but I have someone here I’d like to introduce you to. It will only take a moment.”

Damian knows he’s supposed to put down his book and stand up and show proper manners, but he stays sitting where he is until Bruce clears his throat in warning and he's forced to obey. The woman watches, amusement playing on her sharp face. Damian doesn’t like how close together she and his father are standing.

“Damian, this is Selina Kyle. Selina, this is my son.”

Selina leans down and shakes his hand. “Hello, Damian. It’s nice to meet you. I only wish it could have happened sooner.” The quick glance she shoots Bruce is heated and disapproving, and intriguing to Damian. He’s never seen anyone make his father squirm like that before. “I have a present for you.”

She reaches into her handbag, which Damian realizes is  _squeaking_.

Bruce stares at her in disbelief. “Selina, you don’t  _actually_  have—“

She ignores him and pulls out a perfect black-and-white kitten that she hands to Damian. He holds the yawning, mewing creature against his chest gently, speechless. Bruce has given up trying to protest. It’s too late, anyhow. Damian is keeping this kitten.

“He needs a name,” Selina tells him.

“His name is Alfred,” says Damian decisively.

She blinks in surprise. “Oh, that’s… Why?”

“Because I like Alfred.”

“I’m sure he’ll be very flattered.”

She leaves soon after and Damian thinks that he doesn’t hate her quite so much anymore. But he still doesn’t want her to return here… at least, not without another kitten.

* * *

 

“Father!” Damian stomps into the office and up to the paper-strewn desk where Bruce is working, a lawyer on either side talking him through the endless documents. “You said you would take me to the research laboratories. I want to meet the robots!”

The lab robots probably aren’t the kind Damian has in mind. The lawyer on Bruce’s right, a woman he knows has young children of her own, gives him an amused but commiserating smile as she sets another stack of papers in front of him.

Bruce sighs. “In a bit, Damian. I have a few more documents to go over yet and then I’ll take you.”

“I want to go  _now_!”

“Then go on ahead with Tim. I’ll meet you down there once I’m finished.”

“I don’t want to go with just Tim.” Damian is pouting. “You have to come, too.”

“Then you’ll have to be patient,” says Bruce. “Why don’t you ask Tim to take you down to the cafeteria for something to eat?” Damian sounds like he could use a juice box. That often helps when he’s cranky. Or, more cranky than usual.

His son ignores him, choosing instead to stroll about the office and touch everything within reach of his little hands. Since he’s being quiet, Bruce allows it. Damian picks up framed photos off the side table and examines them, frowns at a potted plant, and climbs onto the sofa and armchairs to test their softness. Bruce already gave him a quick tour of the office, but now he explores it possessively, like he’s appraising it for his own use.

He does look like he fits here, wearing the suit and tie Alfred dressed him in this morning. Bruce’s secretary was very charmed by the sight of him. That was hours ago, however, and with the grumpy mood Damian is in, Bruce feels that he likely owes her an apology by now.

A small hand reaches up over the edge of the desk and snatches away a paper. “What’s this?” asks Damian, trying to read it but slowed down by the legal jargon. “This is about me. It has my name on it.”

“It does.” Bruce gets up and tries to take it away from Damian, only prompting the boy to clutch it closely and scurry away with a taunting smirk on his face. Bruce takes a deep breath. He is not going to chase his son around the room in front of others. “Damian, give that back.”

“What is it?”

“It’s part of my will. I’m having it changed to include you, so that you’ll be able to receive your inheritance when I’m— When you’re old enough.”

Damian returns the paper, looking pleased. “Do I get the house? And the garden?”

“We’ll talk about this more when you’re older.”

“What about the Batcave and the Batmobile?” demands Damian. “You’re not going to give those to Tim or Dick, are you?” When Bruce doesn't answer, Damian becomes stricken, grabbing insistently at his father’s sleeve. “You can’t! I deserve them more. I’m your real son, and I want to be Batman when you’re old more than either of them do!”

His shouts ring in the otherwise silent office. The air seems to have been suddenly sucked from the room. Bruce can feel the astonished stares frozen on the back of his head, and doesn’t dare turn around. He’s dealt with situations like this before. He needs to stay nonchalant, and deflect with a convincing enough explanation. Panic is as good as a confession.

“Damian…” begins Bruce, affecting a patronizing tone he would never use with his son. He is interrupted by quick-thinking Tim, who poked his head into the room at the sound of his name being yelled and heard enough to understand the shocked faces inside.

“Sorry, Bruce,” he says sheepishly, with a weak, apologetic smile. He’s not yet an accomplished enough liar to fool Bruce, but he’s good enough to convince those that don’t know him well, or aren’t Batman. “It’s just… something I’ve been telling him, whenever you’re out late at night or away on a business trip. He gets upset over you being gone so much, so I told him you have to leave because you’re Batman and you’re busy saving the city. It helped at first, but I’m starting to think it was a mistake. Damian really believes it now.”

Bruce nods at Tim gratefully. When he turns around he sees the lawyers back at work, preparing the next papers for Bruce to sign and pretending they weren’t listening. He notices a few pitying glances at Damian over his neglectful, globetrotting, playboy father, but there’s no suspicion. They believe it. The story is going to be all over the company by the end of the work day. It’s better than his secret identity being all over international news.

“Liar!” Damian shrieks in accusation. “My father  _is_  Batman! I saw the—“

Tim slings a brotherly arm around Damian’s neck, muffling the yells in his elbow as he drags the struggling boy to the door. The feigned chumminess is overdoing it, in Bruce’s opinion. “C’mon, buddy. Let’s go to the caf and get some food. I’m starved.” He, too, can recognize when Damian needs a juice box.

* * *

 

“Excuse me, have you seen my son? Excuse me—“ Bruce wedges himself through the crowd as politely as he can, scanning at hip-level for the familiar dark head. “Damian? Damian, where are you?” He resolves to put a better tracking device on his son. The one he’s already wearing, linked to Bruce’s phone, is too imprecise and only confirms that he’s still somewhere around the building.

St Aiden’s Orphanage is crowded with with donors, politicians, and press following the announcement of its major renovation and expansion. Not the last or largest of such projects around the city, Bruce promised during his turn in front of the microphone. He had gotten separated from his son so easily in the hubbub—one moment Damian was holding his hand, the next he was gone, and Bruce was slowed down so much by people wanting to greet him and shake his hand that Damian could be anywhere by now.

He checks by the refreshment table in the main hall, his best guess as to where Damian scampered off to, but his son is not among the greedy young children raiding the dessert tray. Bruce takes a slow breath and tries to calm his hammering heart, but he can’t stop himself from worrying that Damian has been taken by kidnappers—though unlikely, he reminds himself, with all the undercover security he has posted in the building—or, much worse, that the boy has gotten lured into speaking with a  _reporter_.

Damian isn’t nervous around reporters, quite the opposite. He soaks up the attention and adores having someone hanging off his every word. Bruce is the nervous one, never knowing what secrets his son might let slip by accident. Or on purpose, if he thinks it might impress the other party.

In exchange for a brownie from the tallest tiered tray, a young girl not much older than Damian mentions that she  _might_  have seen a dark-haired boy head towards the backyard, before she’s shooed away by one of the nuns. Bruce takes the clue and slips away from the other guests, treading softly through the quiet hallways and hoping he doesn’t run into a disapproving nun. At the end of a hallway he finds the creaky door that opens up to the backyard playground.

All of the children are inside, excited by the event taking place and trying to catch glimpses of the important people. All except for two.

Bruce is relieved to see Damian crouching in the shade under the battered and rusted jungle gym. He and a red-haired boy are inspecting something in the grass and don’t notice Bruce. The red-haired boy coaxes whatever it is onto his hand, and when he lifts it up Bruce can see more clearly that it’s a caterpillar, fuzzy, incredibly large, and endlessly fascinating to children that age.

“I think Batman’s awesome,” the boy is telling Damian, “but I like Superman even better.”

He might as well have insulted Damian directly. “Impossible! Give me one good reason.”

“I dunno. Batman’s too scary. Being scary is what makes him cool, but if I could be like any superhero, I’d want to be a friendly one like Superman or the Flash.”

“Batman’s not scary!” argues Damian. His indignation doesn’t extend to his hands, which are gentle as he receives the caterpillar for his turn at examination, and even more gentle as he places it back down in the grass. “Well, he is, but only to bad guys. Don’t be a coward.”

The other boy shrugs mildly. He doesn’t seem to let Damian’s rudeness bother him much. “I don’t like bats, either. Some live in the attic, and I’m scared to go up there.”

“You’re wrong about Batman. If you met him, you’d see…” Damian stops and cups his chin in his hand thoughtfully, a gesture he’s picked up from watching Bruce. Bruce feels a surge of pride every time he sees it. “What if I could—“

“Damian,” Bruce calls out sternly. He has an idea of the promise Damian is about to make. Damian calmly turns around and stands, unapologetic and unchastened, while the red-haired boy flushes and scurries away like a spooked animal. Bruce considers scolding Damian for sneaking off, but he’s far too pleased by what he just saw. He nods in the direction the boy ran off to. “A new friend?”

“An annoyance,” corrects Damian dismissively, taking his father’s offered hand and letting himself be led back into the noisy building. “His name is Colin. He lives here. He lied about how exciting the caterpillar is—I’ve seen better ones in the garden at home.”

“We have to leave shortly, but I can bring you back here to visit Colin again another day.”

Damian frowns. “Why would I want to do that?”

Later that day, over dinner at the manor, Damian pokes at his green beans and asks conversationally, “Father, how would I go about adopting a child? You’ve done it before.”

Tim drops his fork for an excuse to hide his face. He’s underneath the table for a long time, unsuccessfully fighting back laughter, while Bruce has to explain that Damian is far too young to be responsible for another person, and then that,  _no_ , being responsible for a cat and a dog does not prove him capable of taking care of a child—“ _Orphans are not like pets, Damian_ …”

* * *

 

The first place Damian looks is under the bed. He checks underneath every piece of furniture he can, but all he finds is a pair of his father's shoes. They're far, far too large for him, he notices with dismay. So large that for a moment he can't imagine how he could ever grow that big. But he will. One day.

He rummages around in the drawer of an antique writing table in the corner, pushing aside pens and old boring letters until he uncovers a folded piece of paper near the back. His eyes widen as he unfolds it. It's not what he's been looking for, but it's--

"You're not supposed to be in here," says Bruce. Damian turns, hiding the piece of paper behind his back and refusing to look guilty. Bruce crosses his arms as he looks around at the open drawers and all the carefully folded clothing lying in messy heaps on the floor. "What are you doing?"

"Searching."

"For what?"

"My book," says Damian honestly. "The history of Alexander the Great. I read it to you when you were hurt and couldn't leave bed, and I want to pack it to take to Mama's but I can't find it now. It has to be here somewhere."

"Hm." Bruce peers down at Damian appraisingly, but seems to determine that he is telling the truth, because his expression softens. "You could have just asked me to help you find it."

"Help me find it," orders Damian.

Bruce gives a long-suffering sigh and starts searching, shifting aside pieces of furniture like the armchair and the dresser in order to look behind them, while Damian watches with satisfaction. One day he's going to be just as strong. Bruce soon finds the book wedged behind an end table, where it must have fallen, and hands it over to Damian.

"Thank you," says Damian, only because his father always seems pleased to hear him say it. He smiles down at the well-worn book. Before he can ushered out of the room, he looks up and says, "Father, I have an idea."

"What is your idea?"

"Well, you haven't yet taken me to Disney World like you  _promised_  when you offered to bring me here to live with you..."    

Bruce frowns. "I don't remember--"

"But that's forgivable. I forgive you. And I've decided instead that you and Mama can take me there together, once she's arrived in Gotham. And then afterwards she will take me back to live with her until it is your turn... if there is any time left. I expect it will take several weeks to explore an entire world properly."

"Damian, I don't think we'll be able to make the trip--"

"But Father, we  _must_. It's for my education. There is a castle there, and Mama has taken me to see all sorts of castles as part of my education."

"You can ask your mother to take you. But I won't be able to come along, not right now."

"Why not?" demands Damian angrily.

Bruce takes a moment to answer. When he does, his voice is gentle, his words carefully chosen. "Your mother and I don't get along very well right now. We've had too many... disagreements, and spending too much time together would only make it worse."

"I think you're lying," says Damian, watching his father through narrowed, suspicious eyes. "How can you and Mama not get along if you both love each other and want to be together? And don't tell me I'm wrong!" He brandishes the paper he found in the desk drawer. It's a photograph of his parents together, smiling at each other and looking into each others' eyes. He's never seen them look at each other like that. "I know you love Mama because you keep this picture of both of you. And she keeps your mask and cape in her bedroom, which means she still loves you! Since you both love each other, you need to be together. That's how it works!"

Bruce carefully takes the photo from Damian's hands and folds it up again, deliberately averting his eyes to not look at the picture while he does so. "Damian--"

"If you and Mama were together, I wouldn't have to leave," Damian blurts out, blinking back tears. When that won't stop them, he hides his face behind his sleeve. "I don't want to leave and miss you for a whole month."

He hears the creak of the floorboards as his father kneels next to him. A warm hands strokes his hair. “You don’t have to leave if you don’t want to. You can stay here with me as long as you want.”

"What about Mama?" Damian risks lowering his arm to look at his father, only to have his hopes dashed when he sees the bitter regret on Bruce's face.

“Never mind," Bruce says, angry at his own mistake. He wraps his arms around the boy. "Everything is going to be all right, Damian. I know it seems difficult right now, but... It will get easier."

Damian nods against his father's shoulder, letting himself be held. He can't see how it could possibly be true, but his father has said so, and he can't help but believe his father.

* * *

 

Alfred hurries down the stairs to the cave, his frantic footsteps echoing loudly and making Bruce look away from the computer screens in worry. “I cannot find Master Damian anywhere. Have you—“ He doesn't finish that question. The alarm on Bruce's face is enough of an answer. “His bicycle is gone, and so is the dog. I fear he’s run away.”

Bruce doesn’t ask why Damian would do such a thing. He can’t pretend he hasn’t noticed how troubled his son is, especially with his departure date drawing so near. Talia is arriving in a day and a half to take him away. Bruce pulls up the manor’s surveillance footage and, sure enough, there’s Damian sneaking through a gap in the fence with his bike and a determined expression on his face, almost two hours ago now. Titus follows after a few minutes later.

They send Tim on ahead to start searching the road; hopefully Damian hasn’t gotten too far down it yet. But, just in case he’s already reached the bridge, Alfred and Bruce quickly check his room for clues to where in the city he could be headed. Damian isn’t like other children. He wouldn’t go off on an expedition like this without a clear plan.

Alfred knows exactly where to look. He walks straight towards the overstuffed bookcase and pulls out thick volumes until he finds the battered, coil-bound book hidden behind—Damian’s secret sketchbook, full of the drawings he refused to let any of them see. Most of its pages are loose papers that stick out around the edges, and the front cover is a bit gnawed up from Titus’s chewing phase.

Alfred picks it up as though it’s a weighty thing, far heavier than it looks. He looks from it to Bruce guiltily.

“I don’t like to invade his privacy… However, in these circumstances…”

Taking the book from Alfred’s hands, Bruce carefully turns the cover. He flips through the pages with increasingly shaking hands. All he can see are his own shortcomings as a father reflected back at him. He thinks of all the times he saw Damian scribbling on scrap paper, all those quiet hours of the boy hunched over secretively with pencils and crayons in hand. How could he have not known?

The pictures are all of himself and Talia with Damian, all of them together as a family, over and over. As though Damian could have made his one dream real by drawing it enough times.

“He must have been drawing these since he got here," murmurs Bruce, recalling a familiar feeling of loneliness and yearning from his childhood that's not too different from what has been poured into these pages. He feels like, for the first time, he truly understands his son.

He shuts the sketchbook and returns it to its hiding place. The drawings are enlightening in some ways, but they don’t provide the answers Bruce urgently needs. There are no clues to be found in Damian’s room, and too much time has passed already

“I do suggest you call Miss Talia and tell her what’s happened," urges Alfred. "She knows Damian better than we do. Perhaps she will have some idea...”

Bruce grimaces at the prospect of admitting to Talia that he lost their son, and her inevitable rage, but he has to agree. The only thing that matters right now is finding Damian.

Passing through his study towards the grandfather clock, he notices something strange, and stops. There’s an envelope on his desk, lying on top of the blueprints for the treehouse he is planning to build for Damian before his next visit. Cut-out and pasted newsprint letters on the back of the envelope address it to him.

The note inside is also spelled out with bits of newspaper. Bruce’s eyes narrow. It’s a ransom demand. It gives a location in Gotham and a time for that evening, and warns that both parents must be present for the exchange, or else…

It would perhaps be more convincing if the ransom didn’t have so many zeroes and could realistically fit into a single briefcase like specified, or if the note didn’t smell like the kid’s craft glue with the cow on the bottle, or if it didn’t have a smudge of chocolate on the corner. Still, Damian worked very hard on this note.

Bruce hands it wordlessly to Alfred, and the older man frowns. “Oh dear. So that’s why this morning’s newspaper was cut to shreds. Well, at least this answers the question of where he’s going. Would you still like me to get Miss Talia on the phone? He did request the both of you.”

“No. That won’t be necessary.” Bruce glances once more at the instructions on the note, almost guiltily, but he's never played by a kidnapper’s rules before, and he’s not going to play by his son’s, either. “I’m going to find him and bring him home.”

* * *

 

Damian came up with the idea after seeing a story on the news. Two children who were taken hostage got returned to their parents (with the help of Batman), and in their relief the family all cried and kissed and hugged like they would never let go of each other again.

He was very moved by the scene, and watched it jealously until the news changed to another story. He's decided he will have a moment like that with his own parents. Surely it will mend whatever rift exists between his mother and father. He just needs to get "kidnapped".

His plan is to wait in a park until his parents show up at the meeting place across the street he specified in his note, and then after letting them wait and worry for a few minutes he will reveal himself and they'll be so happy to see him that they'll all hug and vow to never be apart again, all disagreements between his parents forgotten forever. Unfortunately, the city is more confusing than he expected, and the park is proving impossible to find. He must have taken a wrong turn somewhere.

Damian thinks back to his wilderness training. His tutor taught him how to never be lost, using the sky and plants and natural landmarks to tell his way. Unfortunately, none of those rules apply in a city like Gotham. The best he can do is retrace his steps and keep moving.

As he pedals past a newsstand, he's pleased to see a picture of himself and his father on a magazine. He wants to stop and read, but Titus has seen an exciting mailbox to sniff and pulls him along quickly. Damian  _tt’_ s in annoyance. He didn't  _want_  to bring the lumbering mutt. Titus followed him off the manor grounds carrying a leash in his mouth, convinced that Damian had gone off on a walk and simply forgotten him. And he refused to go back home, so Damian had no choice but to take him along into the city, aware of how much more conspicuous he'll be with a gigantic, easily recognizable dog at his side.

On every street, someone walks up to Damian, clearly concerned to see a five-year-old wandering through the city with only his dog, and asks if he's lost, if he needs them to help find his parents. Damian just scowls and pedals faster, leaving them in his dust. He has somewhere to be.

Damian follows a woman with a stroller for a few blocks, hoping she might lead him to the park, but she takes notice and keeps glancing back with a mixture of worry and curiosity. Before she can ask him questions like everyone else, he drags Titus into an alleyway to hide.

A nearby dumpster is overflowing and Damian wrinkles his nose, careful to step around the suspicious puddles as he pulls Titus around the corner. And then, suddenly, Titus is pulling  _him_. The dog barks like Damian has never heard before. Hackles raised, he growls at two other dogs in the shadows, menacing figures that advance on them slowly. But, as they come into the light, Damian realizes that those aren't  _dogs_ —

"There ya are, babies!" A woman's voice rings out. Damian turns. "Now, what do we got here?"

* * *

 

"Sir, Miss Talia is on the line," Alfred says through the onboard computer while Bruce is waiting at a red light. "She wishes to speak with you."

Bruce scowls. “Alfred…”

“Master Damian missed his video call with her this afternoon. She suspects something is wrong. You might as well tell her.”

Alfred doesn't give him much of a choice in the matter, switching her onto his line with a  _click_.

“Hello, Talia," Bruce says calmly.

“Where is my son?” she demands, her voice chilling.

“He ran away,” Bruce admits, glad that he doesn’t have to look her in the eye. “He took his bike and left for the city. But I know exactly where he’s headed and I’m already searching. It shouldn’t take long to find him.” He scans the sidewalks as he drives—surely it can’t be too hard to spot Damian and Titus. If only it were darker outside, and he could search from the rooftops as Batman without causing a commotion. “Call me back in an hour, I’ll have him home by then.”

“Oh, Beloved. You have no idea," Talia says ruefully. “You have no idea what our son is capable of. And I won't have to call--an hour from now, I'll be in Gotham. We'll speak in person.”

"How--" begins Bruce, surprised that she's so close by, but she hangs up on him before he can ask.

* * *

 

The woman in front of Damian is… strange… and not just because she has two hyenas as her pets, as evident by the leashes she’s clipping onto them. Her eyes are a bit too wide and she talks a bit too loud, her hair in two messy pigtails and her outfit so colourful and ripped and clashing that it hurts to look at.

"You seem a little lost, kid. What are—“ Gasping, she claps a hand over her mouth. “Wait! I know you! You’re... You're Bruce Wayne's new boy, arentcha? I've been seeing you all over the gossip rags. This must be my lucky day—just this week I was saying to Red, 'Can you imagine how much Wayne would pay up if--'" She stops herself, cocking her head to the side and peering at Damian suspiciously. "What are you doing out here all alone, anyway?"

"I ran away," he says proudly, not that it's any of her business. He's just sick of adults asking him if he's lost and needs help. He knows exactly what he's doing. "I'm pretending I was kidnapped so my parents will worry, and then once I'm home safe they'll be so happy they'll want to be together again. Do you know the way to the nearest park?"

"That's quite the parent trap you got planned there, kiddo,” she says with a laugh, then becomes thoughtful, tapping a finger against her chin. "But you know what's even more convincing than a fake kidnapping?"

"What?"

"A real kidnapping! Or, a real-er kidnapping,” she amends, grinning widely. She spreads her hands innocently. "What do ya say, kid? I'm a pretty notorious gal. Name's Harley. I promise if your parents find out I'm your kidnapper, they'll go outta their minds with worry. You can hang out at my place and I won't even tie you up or nothing. And at the end of the day I'll get a sack full of cash and you'll get your parents falling back in love. Deal?"

Damian thinks seriously about her offer. He looks to Titus for input, but the dog is preoccupied, still baring his teeth at the laughing hyenas. What do dogs know, anyway? "I don't make deals with unsavoury types,” he tells Harley, holding his chin high and refusing to shake her offered hand. “But I'll go with you, for now."

He doesn’t trust her, but he has his dagger with him, so he's not worried. And she’s right about his kidnapping being more believable this way… He was worried, while making the note for his father, that there was the slim chance it wouldn’t be convincing enough. So he tugs his reluctant dog along and follows Harley.

She takes him to a building that looks like an abandoned warehouse from the outside, but on the inside looks like a not-so-abandoned warehouse. It's full of  _stuff_. Expensive stuff. Open crates full of everything from paintings to electronics to dog toys, racks of evening gowns with the tags still on, and even sacks of cash lying on the floor, bills spilling out. And, between everything, unruly plants grow from pots like they're trying to take over the entire room. A woman with red hair is watering flowerpots on the windowsill. Harley calls out to her cheerfully.

"Red! I'm home! And you'll never believe who I brought for dinner!"

The woman turns. "Harley, what on earth…" She's just as shocked to see Damian as he is to see her. Her skin is  _green_ , and Damian knows who she is, he saw her in his father's criminal database. She's Poison Ivy. He must be scowling at her without realizing it, because she mirrors the expression. "Who is  _that_?"

"Wayne's kid," says Harley. Damian, looking at her in a new light, now realizes that she is Harley  _Quinn_ , another Gotham criminal. Suddenly everything makes a lot more sense. He feels for his dagger to make sure it's still there. He's still not scared, though. If it comes to a fight, he's sure he could take them on.

“Wayne’s— Bruce Wayne's son?” Poison Ivy asks incredulously, nearly dropping her watering can. One of the plants reaches out a tendril and catches it before it hits the ground. "I can't believe you went through with the plan already! We only just started talking about—"

Harley shushes her frantically. ”Relax. I didn't snatch him. I bumped into him on the street, and he just about begged me to kidnap him." She explains the events in the alleyway. Ivy looks as skeptical as Harley is excited. “So you see? Everybody wins!"

Giving Damian a suspicious look, Ivy drags Harley behind a stack of crates to have a hushed argument. They reemerge a minute later, and Ivy glares at Damian again. “Don’t touch my plants,” she tells him warningly, before she leaves the room. He scowls and pokes the nearest potted plant out of spite, and has to jump back to avoid getting slapped by a branch in retaliation.

Harley has a lot of experience with kidnappings, apparently. She claims they need to wait a while before calling and making the ransom demands, long enough to make his father sweat and worry, and she digs out a television and video games, all still in their packaging, from the piles of boxes to give them something to do in the meantime.

"... and he wouldn't take me to Disney World, even though he promised," says Damian as they start another race. This video game is much more fun than the boring ones Tim has on his computer, which Damian isn't allowed to touch anymore after "ruining months of gameplay" or so Tim claimed. Titus is lying with his head on Damian's knee, uneasy about being in the same room as the hyenas even though they're fast asleep in the corner.

Harley shakes her head sympathetically. “That's a cryin' shame. Is he really that stingy? I thought a moneybags like him would be throwing cash at his kids."

"It's not about the cost. He always says he doesn't have time."

"Figures," she scoffs. Then pumps her fist into the air as her car crosses the finish line. "Tell you what—if he still won't take you to Disney World after this, then  _I_  will. I'll definitely have the funds for it."

"My parents wouldn't allow me to go on a trip with you."

"True. I could kidnap you again. Get even more money out of them." She looks thoughtful for a moment, then shrugs. "We'll see."

Ivy returns and pulls Harley away to talk again. When they come back, Ivy is holding a camera and a length of rope, and Harley is dragging a chair from the kitchen.

Damian jumps to his feet, one hand reaching slowly for his dagger. "You said you wouldn't tie me up," he says with narrowed eyes.

"Yeah, well, we need to take some pics for your folks, and they gotta look convincing. Show me your scared face," Harley urges. Damian scowls at her. "No,  _scared_. I can give you some incentive, if you need."

"I want to call my father now," Damian says coldly.

She frowns, confused. "Oh, I wasn't threatening you," she insists with a laugh, as she realizes. "I just meant I'd make scary faces. I'm good at those."

"Leave my dog alone!" Damian yells at the hyenas. Titus, keyed into his owner's distress, started growling at Harley, and now the hyenas are snapping at him and backing him into a corner to protect  _their_  owner. Damian pulls out his dagger.

"Hey! Put that down!" exclaims Harley.

"Children shouldn't play with knives," says Ivy. A potted plant reaches out a thorny vine and yanks the knife away from him roughly. Damian cradles his sore hand, glaring at both of the women.

“You better not try to hurt me,” he says. It's not a threat, not really. Just fair warning. “Or else my mother will kill both of you. But first she’ll hurt you back, a hundred times worse, to get justice.”

Poison Ivy raises an eyebrow, but looks unafraid. “Who’s your mother?”

“Talia al Ghul." They all turn in the direction of the new voice. A woman in a leather suit with a cat-eared hood and goggles is climbing through the open window. “You know, the daughter of Ra’s al Ghul. Probably the most powerful and wealthy woman in the world, with thousands of trained assassins at her beck and call. This is her son, and she’s searching for him as we speak. What is he doing  _here_?”

Harley and Ivy look horrified. Harley edges away from Damian like she can disassociate herself from him, then she gasps and slaps a hand over her mouth, her eyes wide.

"Wait. If she's the mom, then... How did Bruce Wayne— And  _her_ —!"

The cat-eared woman smirks. "Talia al Ghul attends quite a few high society parties under aliases. Mostly for business, sometimes for pleasure. I make sure to steer clear of her when I'm working, even though her jewelry is always very tempting. It's not worth it. I'm not surprised she and Wayne have crossed paths. He was probably too stupid to realize who he was sleeping with."

Damian snarls, face flushed red with outrage. "How dare—"

The woman ignores him. "Trust me," she tells Harley and Ivy. "Nothing is worth angering the al Ghuls. Not a sapphire necklace, no matter how many ancient queens it must have belonged to before they got their hands on it, and not whatever ransom you'll get for the kid. You'll be running from assassins for the rest of your lives. Even Arkham won't be safe."

"I'm not scared, Catwoman," says Ivy, inspecting her nails. They're sharp, like rose thorns. "Let them try to kill me."

"They won't just attack you. The al Ghuls aren't just ruthless, they're clever. You think they won't track down every one of your greenhouses and burn them to the ground? They've done worse for less."

Harley is flailing in panic. "We get it, we get it!" she exclaims. "But what are we gonna do about it now? We've already got the kid." She turns to her hyenas, who are still cackling threateningly at Titus. "Babies, stay away from that dog.  _Heel_. That's the al Ghul's dog you're messin' with. It's probably an assassin, too."

"I'll bring him to Batman, he'll take it from there," says Catwoman, gripping Damian's arm tightly. If he had his dagger, he would be stabbing her right now. "I'll say I found the kid wandering the streets. Batman will believe me--he knows I'm not the kidnapping type, and besides, even though Wayne only reported him as missing, everyone knows the kid ran away. Half the city's reported sightings of him and his dog."

"They won't believe you," Damian scoffs. He points at his kidnappers accusingly. "The moment I tell my mother about what these two--"

Catwoman pinches his arm hard, making him yelp. "It's the only chance you've got," she tells the other women, pulling Damian towards the window. "A group of assassins could burst in here any second. I'm taking him now."

Damian squirms away from her grip. "I'm not going out the window," he says, crossing his arms stubbornly. "Titus can't. And I need to get my bicycle."

"I knew he was more trouble than he's worth," Damian hears Ivy mutter as he walks past her towards the door. "Little brat."

Out of spite, Damian kicks over a potted plant, smiling as it smashes against the floor, but he stops smiling when thorny vines erupt from every corner of the room and fly at him like striking cobras. Catwoman scoops him up and sprints, and they still barely make it outside.

* * *

 

Catwoman scolds Damian the entire way to the park.

“… and not just strangers, but  _criminals_. Seriously, haven’t your parents taught you anything? Don’t get into strange vans. Don’t take candy from strangers. Don’t—“

“I know how to take care of myself," Damian snaps. He's in a bad enough mood as it is, with his plan a complete failure and his bicycle crushed by those angry plants. At least Titus got out safely. “And you’re a stranger, too! And probably a criminal!”

She blinks in surprise, then gives a sly smile. “Well, I plead guilty to one of those charges. You really don’t recognize me, Damian?”

He stares at her. “Oh.”

“How’s your kitten doing?”

“Yesterday he scratched up a bunch of papers on my dad’s desk," says Damian. "I think they were important." Selina looks delighted.

She parts with him at the entrance to the quiet park. The only person in sight within is a man sitting on a bench, alone in the dark. Selina waves at him before she leaves, and Damian realizes, with a mixture of relief and dread, that it's his father. He rushes down the path. Bruce stands and meets him halfway, and holds open his arms so that Damian can run into them for a hug. He sniffles against his father's shoulder, feeling horrible to have worried him so much with the fake kidnapping.

“Damian, I’ve been looking all over the city for you! If it wasn’t for Selina—"

A car door slams loudly, making them both turn to see a stopped limousine and a woman hurrying across the grass towards them. Damian's heart leaps in joy. Soon he's being enveloped in another hug, surrounded by the familiar, flowery scent of his mother. He's missed her so much these past weeks that this feels like a dream.

“Darling! Thank goodness. Are you hurt at all?”

“No, Mama. I’m fine," he insists, but she looks him up and down for scrapes or bruises anyway. Damian watches both of his relieved parents expectantly, waiting for them to embrace or kiss like the parents on the news, but they don't. His mother and father barely even look at each other. They're both too focused on him.

“I knew you would be. My strong boy.” Talia hugs him again, squeezing even tighter. “But what possessed you to run off like that?”

He looks down at his feet, ashamed. Although more from his plan  _failing_  than from going through with the plan itself. “I… I just…”

“We’ll talk about this at home," says Bruce, and Talia nods.

But Damian doesn't last that long. By the time they all get into the backseat of the limousine, Damian sandwiched between his parents with Titus sprawled at his feet, he's blurting out his entire plan and the ways it went wrong and apologizing more times than he has in his entire life. The words all come out in a barely comprehensible rush, but his parents understand that he's upset. His father places a hand on his shoulder and his mother kisses him on the top of the head.

"It's fine, son," says Bruce. "All that matter is that you're safe. I can tell you've learned your lesson."

“So I'm not in trouble?" Damian asks hopefully.

"Oh, no. You're in trouble." Bruce frowns, silent for a moment. "I'll... I'll think of an appropriate punishment."

"He means he's going to ask Alfred," Talia whispers to Damian, and then, raising her voice, says to Bruce: "Perhaps the same one Alfred gave you when you ran away at seven years old?" She looks back to Damian. "Have you heard that story? Your father--"

"Talia,  _don't_."

"You're right, Beloved. Alfred is so much better at telling it," Talia says lightly. She kisses Damian on the nose. "And I've run away from your grandfather more times than I can count. At twelve I took one of his stealth jets and left for an entire weekend. So don't feel too badly, my love. You get it from us."

As they pass through the manor gates, Damian knows his time in Gotham is coming to an end. He won't be back for a whole month, which might as well be forever. And, even though he loves his mama more than anyone in the world and can't wait to spend time with her again, he'll miss his father and Alfred and Dick, and even  _Tim_.

He would miss his pets as well, except that he's decided he won't allow them to stay behind. He'll hide Titus in a suitcase if he has to.

As if reading his mind, Talia asks, "Are your things packed? We'll be leaving in the morning."

He nods with a sense of grim acceptance. "Is the island safe again, or are we going somewhere else?"                  

Talia smiles, looking from Damian to Bruce and back. "Actually, my love, I've been meaning to tell you... A  _very_  exciting job opportunity has just opened up for me in Metropolis. We'll be living within two hours of your father. Won't that be wonderful?"

Bruce looks as surprised as Damian. Both of them sit, speechless, while Talia watches in amusement. The limo skids to a stop in front of the manor.

"Yes, Mama," says Damian, and he means it. It's not exactly what he's dreamed of, but it's a step in the right direction. And, of course, the closer his parents live to each other the easier it will be for him to enact other,  _better_  plans to bring them back together. What was the term Harley used?  _Parent traps_.

He holds onto both his mother's and father's hands as they walk up the steps to the manor, the hope blooming in his chest making him feel light as air.


End file.
